Application of medical standards in the work of professional nurses in a private healthcare facility

Background. Healthcare facilities are organizations continually striving to improve the quality of services they provide. Medical staff play a vitally important role in healthcare facilities and are largely responsible for the unique character of their services. Nurses are the most valuable resource of any healthcare system. Their skills, dedication, motivation, and professional competencies determine the quality of the service. It would be impossible to ensure the provision of adequate nursing care without defining its methods and guiding principles. Medical standards and procedures are tools helping to manage a healthcare facility effectively. They are a strategic element of the process of continuous improvement of the quality of service as they serve as models in their planning and evaluation. Objectives. To gain a better understanding of service standardization in medical care and to find out whether such solutions are being used in nursing practice and whether they are helpful in the work of professional nurses. Material and methods. The study was conducted on a group of 25 nurses employed in an existing health care facility. They had to answer 32 questions in a questionnaire designed by the author of this paper. The questions concerned the respondents’ familiarity with standards and procedures, their practical application and the impact they have on the quality of service. Results. The results of this research project show that the central question, i.e., “Are medical standards and procedures being followed in the healthcare facility which employs you?” was answered affirmatively. Conclusions. All nurses in the group showed interest in the issue of the quality of healthcare services. They claimed that the introduction and application of procedures and standards of nursing care enables the improvement of the quality of service. Most of the nurses from the study group know what standard of medical care is, and apply and observe in practice the procedures and standards of nursing care, fulfilling the recommendations and requirements set by the employing healthcare facility.