Matching Registered Nurse Services With Changing Care Demands in Psychiatric Hospitals: Protocol for a Multicenter Observational Study (MatchRN Psychiatry Study)
Authors: Gehri Beatrice , Bachnick Stefanie , Schwendimann René , Simon Michael 
Published: August 2021

Background

The quality of care is often poorly assessed in mental health settings, and accurate evaluation requires the monitoring and comparison of not only the outcomes but also the structures and processes. The resulting data allow hospital administrators to compare their patient outcome data against those reported nationally. As Swiss psychiatric hospitals are planned and coordinated at the cantonal level, they vary considerably. In addition, nursing care structures and processes, such as nurse staffing, are only reported and aggregated at the national level, whereas nurse outcomes, such as job satisfaction or intention to leave, have yet to be assessed in Swiss psychiatric hospitals. Because they lack these key figures, psychiatric hospitals’ quality of care cannot be reasonably described.

Objective

This study’s purpose is to describe health care quality by exploring hospital structures such as nurse staffing and the work environment; processes such as the rationing of care; nurse outcomes, including job satisfaction and work-life balance; and patients’ symptom burden.

Methods

MatchRN Psychiatry is a multicenter observational study of Swiss psychiatric hospitals. The sample for this study included approximately 1300 nurses from 113 units of 13 psychiatric hospitals in Switzerland’s German-speaking region. In addition, routine patient assessment data from each participating hospital were included. The nurse survey consisted of 164 items covering three dimensions—work environment, patient safety climate, and the rationing of care. The unit-level questionnaire included 57 items, including the number of beds, number of nurses, and nurses’ education levels. Routine patient data included items such as main diagnosis, the number and duration of freedom-restrictive measures, and symptom burden at admission and discharge. Data were collected between September 2019 and June 2021. The data will be analyzed descriptively by using multilevel regression linear mixed models and generalized linear mixed models to explore associations between variables of interest.

Results

The response rate from the nurse survey was 71.49% (1209/1691). All data are currently being checked for consistency and plausibility. The MatchRN Psychiatry study is funded by the participating psychiatric hospitals and the Swiss Psychiatric Nursing Leaders Association (Vereinigung Pflegekader Psychiatrie Schweiz).

Conclusions

For the first time, the MatchRN Psychiatry study will systematically evaluate the quality of care in psychiatric hospitals in Switzerland in terms of organizational structures, processes, and patient and nurse outcomes. The participating psychiatric hospitals will benefit from findings that are relevant to the future planning of nurse staffing. The findings of this study will contribute to improvement strategies for nurses’ work environments and patient experiences in Swiss psychiatric hospitals.

International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID)

DERR1-10.2196/26700