Variations in patient safety climate and perceived quality of collaboration between professions in out-of-hours care

Zalika Klemenc-Ketis,^1–3 Ellen Tveter Deilkås,⁴ Dag Hofoss,⁵ Gunnar Tschudi Bondevik<sup>6,7

1</sup>Department of Family Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Maribor, Maribor, ²Department of Family Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, ³Community Health Centre Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia; ⁴Health Services Research Unit, Akershus University Hospital, Lørenskog, ⁵Institute of Health and Society, University of Oslo, Oslo, ⁶Department of Global Public Health and Primary Care, University of Bergen, Bergen, ⁷National Centre for Emergency Primary Health Care, Uni Research Health, Bergen, Norway


Purpose: To get an overview of health care workers perceptions of patient safety climates and the quality of collaboration in Slovenian out-of-hours health care (OOHC) between professional groups.
Materials and methods: This was a cross-sectional study carried out in all (60) Slovenian OOHC clinics; 37 (61.7%) agreed to participate with 438 employees. The questionnaire consisted of the Slovenian version of the Safety Attitudes Questionnaire – Ambulatory Version (SAQ-AV).
Results: The study sample consisted of 175 (70.0%) physicians, nurse practitioners, and practice nurses. Practice nurses reported the highest patient safety climate scores in all dimensions. Total mean (standard deviation) SAQ-AV score was 60.9±15.2. Scores for quality of collaboration between different professional groups were high. The highest mean scores were reported by nurse practitioners on collaboration with practice nurses (4.4±0.6). The lowest mean scores were reported by practice nurses on collaboration with nurse practitioners (3.8±0.9).
Conclusion: Due to large variations in Slovenian OOHC clinics with regard to how health care workers from different professional backgrounds perceive safety culture, more attention should be devoted to improving the team collaboration in OOHC. A clearer description of professional team roles should be provided.

Keywords: patient care management, out-of-hours medical care, primary health care, patient safety