title: Selected determinants of the quality of hospital care. III. Scope of duties, authorization and responsibility among members of a therapeutic team.
abstract: An important precondition for an effectively working team is the distribution of competence among the members of the team. The accreditation criteria for Polish hospitals lay down a requirement concerning the formulation in a written form of the scope of duties, authorization and responsibility at individual workplaces. This conditions a high level of services provided by the members of a therapeutic team. Therefore, the study was undertaken in order to discover whether there was an explicit share of competence and if it exerted an influence on the level of performance of the scope of duties, authorization and responsibility among members of therapeutic teams in hospital wards. The study covered 55 ward head/managers of clinics, 72 ward head nurses, 106 assistant doctors and 327 charge nurses from 21 hospitals, who were employed in 4 hospitals which possessed the Quality Certificate, and in 17 hospitals without accreditation. The study was conducted by the method of a diagnostic survey, the technique being a questionnaire form. The results of comparative analysis showed that among members of therapeutic teams in hospitals with the Quality Certificate the distribution of occupational competence was significantly more often observed. The greatest number of respondents in this group possessed the scope of duties, authorization and responsibility in a written form, compared to physicians and nurses from hospitals without accreditation. Moreover, it was confirmed that the most frequent lack of the scope of duties in a written form as well as the greatest discrepancies concerning the performance of occupational tasks were noted among the members of therapeutic teams in clinical hospitals without accreditation.
authors.affiliation: Independent Outpatient Public Health Care Unit, Military Hospital, Department of Management in Nursing, Faculty of Nursing and Health Sciences, Medical University, Lublin.
authors.forename: Lidia
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Sierpińska
authors.forename: Anna
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ksykiewicz-Dorota
mesh_terms: D000068:Accreditation / Q000592:standards*; D002568:Certification / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D008505:Medical Staff, Hospital / Q000592:standards*; D015401:Nursing Administration Research; D009732:Nursing Care / Q000592:standards; D009741:Nursing Staff, Hospital / Q000592:standards*; D010348:Patient Care Team / Q000592:standards*; D011044:Poland; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care / Q000592:standards*; D017749:Total Quality Management / Q000592:standards*