Exploring the Relationship Between Nurse Manager Competency Development, Competency, and Patient Outcomes

Nurse-sensitives indicators (NSI) are avoidable adverse patient events and include hospitalacquired infections, pressure ulcers, and patient falls. Rates of NSIs vary based on nurse staffing and the quality of nurse work environments. Nurse managers are responsible for creating professional practice environments and quality patient outcomes. They are critical to organizational success yet often lack the necessary competencies for the role. Although recommendations for graduate education in nursing administration have been made, many nurse managers develop critical leadership competencies for the position through on-the-job experience and continuing education. What is not clearly understood is the impact of competency development strategy on actual attainment of competence and patient outcomes. This study proposes to enroll a national sample of nurse managers through Press Ganey. Nurse managers survey data will be linked to NDNQI data. Data will be analyzed using multi-level methods. The findings from this study will advance our understanding of nurse manager competency development and specifically, what strategies are most effective in accelerating learning and the impact on patient outcomes.