Abstract

Background and Objective: Effective communication is an essential part of nursing profession and is one of the important tools of nurses to support patients and their family members. That is one of the effective factors for improving the outcomes of health care services. The purpose of this study was to investigate the communication skills of nurses and their correlation with the quality of hospital services from patients' viewpoints. Materials and Methods: In the cross-sectional study, a total of 402 patients hospitalized in two hospitals in Yazd province (Iran) participated. The quality of inpatient care was measured using the Service Quality (SERVQUAL) scale. SERVQUAL examines dimensions of tangibles, empathy, reliability, assurance, and responsiveness of hospital inpatients services. The communication skills of nurses from patients' viewpoints were assessed by communication part of Quality of care questionnaire. Data were analyzed by Spearman's correlation coefficient and Mann-Whitney U-test using the SPSS. Results: There was a positive, significant correlation between communication skills of nurses and the quality of inpatient care (r = 0.312, P < 0.005). The dimension of responsiveness had the strongest correlation with communication skills (r = 0.314) and the highest gap in quality service was observed in the dimensions of reliability and tangibles. Conclusion: Considering the relationship between communication skills of nurses and service quality dimensions, improving communication skills of hospital staff can lead to an increase in the quality of health care in these centers.