Impacts of Occupational Cognitive Failure and Subjective Workload on Patient Safety Incidents among Intensive Care Units Nurses

Mahboubeh Jarahian Mohammady; Asieh Sedighi; Tahereh Khaleghdoost; Ehsan Kazem Nejad; Nazila Javadi-Pashaki

doi:10.4103/ijoem.IJOEM_22_20

Impacts of Occupational Cognitive Failure and Subjective Workload on Patient Safety Incidents among Intensive Care Units Nurses

Indian J Occup Environ Med. 2020 May-Aug;24(2):96-101. doi: 10.4103/ijoem.IJOEM_22_20. Epub 2020 Aug 19.

Authors

Mahboubeh Jarahian Mohammady¹, Asieh Sedighi², Tahereh Khaleghdoost², Ehsan Kazem Nejad³, Nazila Javadi-Pashaki⁴

Affiliations

¹ Rasoul-e-Akram Hospital, MSN, Guilan Social Security Organization, Guilan University of Medical Sciences, Rasht, Iran.
² Department of Nursing (Medical-Surgical), School of Nursing and Midwifery, Guilan University of Medical Sciences, Rasht, Iran.
³ Department of Statistics, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Guilan University of Medical Sciences, Rasht, Iran.
⁴ Social Determinants of Health Research Center (SDHRC), Guilan University of Medical Sciences, Rasht, Iran.

Abstract

Background: Life-saving treatments and high-quality care techniques increase the opportunity for patient safety incidents in Intensive care unit.

Aims: This descriptive correlation study aimed to determine the impacts of occupational cognitive failure and subjective workload on patient safety incidents among intensive care units nurses.

Methods and material: One hundred seventy-six nurses working in intensive care units were included using census sampling. The data collection tools consisted of demographic and occupational data, standard questionnaires of subjective workload (NASA-TLX) and occupational cognitive failure (OCFQ), and a question about frequency of patient safety incidents. Data analysis was performed using Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis, Spearman rank correlation coefficient, and logistic regression tests.

Results: Occupational cognitive failure (OR = 1.043), subjective workload in dimension of "performance" (OR = 0.982), age (OR = 0.947), and gender (OR = 3.726) were important predictive variables of patient safety incidents.

Conclusions: Nursing mangers and policymakers can consider the factors identified for staffing nurses and development of patient safety programs.

Keywords: Medical error; nursing; patient safety; psychology; workload.