Abstract
Background: Effective communication between nurses and doctors is crucial for the safe delivery of healthcare services. The demands of the healthcare system for an ideal way to address the issue with miscommunication has been a challenge as it has been an ongoing concern for a long time now. The COVID-19 pandemic has further exacerbated the challenges related to the retention of the health workforce, rapid turnover of trained staff, and massive employment of overseas-qualified nurses and doctors. This study aims to explore the barriers and enablers of communication between nurses and doctors who are working in acute clinical settings.
Methods: Five online databases via the University of Otago were used to search for key words "nurs*", "doctor OR physician", and "communication". Results were screened using the inclusion and exclusion criteria. A manual search of the literature was also performed by cross-referencing studies that were found during the electronic database search. There were 2434 studies identified from Ovid Nursing, Ovid Emcare, Medline, CINAHL, and PubMed, which resulted in fourteen literatures being included in this study. These were subjected to quality appraisal using the JBI tools. Data synthesis was completed using Microsoft Whiteboard and was/then analysed using Braun and Clarke's thematic analysis.
Results: There were three main themes identified as barriers and facilitators of effective communication and they are individual attributes, workplace culture, and message-related factors. The three main themes covered a smaller group of factors that were categorised in this study as subthemes. Altogether, there are seven subthemes which are personal and professional attributes (under individual attributes); hierarchy, organisational factors, and processes (workplace culture); content, and method (message-related).
Conclusions: The factors influencing the effectiveness of communication encompass the interventions that organisations usually do such as introducing ISBAR framework and more advanced communication technology. There are factors that are specific to individuals or the organisation. Although these factors are difficult or even impossible to change, it is important to find a way that these can be refined to what would fit the requirements of the job.