Quality is defined by the American Nurses Association (2021) as the extent to which care services are

consistent with changing nursing knowledge and increase the probability of desired outcomes for patients,
families, groups, communities, and populations. There are three main aspects to this definition: (1) the
services or the nursing interventions; (2) the desirable outcomes, which are subjective to healthcare
consumers; and (3) the consistency with the evolving knowledge on nursing or administering
evidence-based practice. Quality nursing care is an essential advantage of health service providers in
providing healthcare services. There are various developments on the quality of healthcare services
provided due to: (1) technological advancements; (2) transitions in patients’ opinions and expectations
about healthcare; (3) increased competition in the healthcare industry; and (4) patient involvement in their
healthcare (Freitas, Silva, Minamisava, Bezerra, & Sousa, 2014). Great communication skills are an
important aspect of providing quality care. According to Heath (2019), effective and empathetic
communication of nurses with patients is a key skill in improving the patient experience. As nurses spend
most of their time with patients, providing quality patient education and alleviating patient concerns
increase patient satisfaction.

According to Hanefield et al. (2017), in measuring the quality of care to increase service demand, it is
essential to focus on the perceptions of quality rather than the clinical indicators. In their research study,
they identified six distinct challenges in the measurement and conceptualization of quality care. These
are: discern quality as a driver of service utilization; quality as a social construct co-produced by families,
individuals, networks, and providers; quality as a concept shaped over time by experience; responsiveness
as a key attribute of quality; the role of management and other so-called upstream factors; and the
implications of our observations for measurement. The study conducted by Karaca and Durna in 2019 has
supported their statement in regards to the measurement of quality care. Their results showed that patients
were more satisfied with the concern and care displayed by the nurses than with the information they were
given.

Leading healthcare systems, specifically providers, aim to achieve two distinctive targets: patient safety
and quality care. Additionally, these two have regularly been the main objectives of policymakers and
healthcare regulators. Healthcare professionals and patients are two key components in achieving these
objectives. As healthcare professionals value long-term and sustainable solutions in administering
services, patients are more likely to evaluate short-term comforts. This difference in perspective is due to
the different experiences of each individual. It is imperative to find the right balance within the two
perspectives to improve healthcare systems (Al-Jabri et al., 2021). Due to the recent COVID-19
pandemic, more challenges have arisen in attaining quality care, as all healthcare systems in the world
have made appropriate but sudden changes in healthcare policies.

As COVID-19 has widely spread at an exponential rate globally and drastically impacted the healthcare
sector, nurses have been given a critical role in managing infected patients. Adapting to this role while
ensuring the highest quality of nursing care has been a challenging responsibility for nurses, healthcare
providers, administrators, and legislators. The recent pandemic has highlighted the importance of
understanding the quality of nursing care (Alhowaymel et al., 2022). Nurses continue to be at the front
line of patient care in hospitals while actively involving community monitoring and evaluation, regardless
of the occurrence of the global pandemic. To adapt to their additional responsibilities due to COVID-19,
nurses have integrated their previous responsibilities, such as ensuring patient acquisition of personalized,
high-quality services, into their modern tasks in concern with the pandemic, such as engaging in planning
for anticipated COVID-19-related outbreaks in the community (Fawaz et al., 2020).

In the Philippines, young adult nurses, averaging the age of 29, have taken on several responsibilities
during the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study by Navales et al. (2021), they have noted that most of their
participants were not certified in their specialties. However, the quality of nursing work life is high,
suggesting that these local nurses have displayed commendatory attitudes and practices during the
COVID-19 pandemic. Despite these results, the authors have recommended that the nurses take
specialized education to ensure high-quality care.

Studying the real-world experiences of community health nurses in a local setting is crucial to ensuring
high patient quality care in the community of Santa Rosa, Laguna because quality improvement in
hospitals is a crucial framework in providing and improving patient care quality administered by
healthcare professionals. These experiences might significantly alter how nurses feel about quality
improvement. Adolfo et al. (2021) state that nurses' attitudes toward qualitative improvement are directly
correlated with their pay and workload. Understanding the improvements in COVID-19-related quality
care may be aided by evaluating these factors.

References:
Adolfo C, Albougami A, Roque M, Almazan J. (2021). Nurses’ attitudes toward quality improvement in
hospitals: Implications for nursing management systems. Nursing Practice Today.
https://doi.org/10.18502/npt.v8i3.5935

American Nurses Association. (2021). Nursing: Scope and standards of practice (4th ed.). American
Nurses Association.

Alhowaymel, F., Abaoud, A., Alhuwaimel, A.,. Alenezi, A., and Alsayed, N. (2022). COVID-19 Patients’
Satisfaction Levels with Nursing Care: A Cross-Sectional Study. Sage Journals.
https://doi.org/10.1177/23779608221078163

Al-Jabri, F., Kvist, T., Sund, R. and Turunen, H. (2021). Quality of care and patient safety at healthcare
institutions in Oman: quantitative study of the perspectives of patients and healthcare professionals. BMC
Health Services Research. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-021-07152-2

Fawaz, M., Anshasi, H., and Samaha, A. (2020). Nurses at the Front Line of COVID-19: Roles,
Responsibilities, Risks, and Rights. The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.
https://doi.org/10.4269%2Fajtmh.20-0650

Freitas, J. S. , Silva, A. E. B. C. , Minamisava, R. , Bezerra, A. L. Q. , & Sousa, M. R. G. (2014). Quality

Hanefield, J., Powell-Jackson, T., and Balabanova, D. (2017). Understanding and measuring quality of
care: dealing with complexity. National Library of Medicine. https://doi.org/10.2471%2FBLT.16.179309
Heath, S. (2019). How Quality Nursing Care Impacts Patient Satisfaction, Experience. Patient
Engagement HIT.
https://patientengagementhit.com/news/how-quality-nursing-care-impacts-patient-satisfaction-experience

Karaca, A. and Durna, Z. (2019). Patient satisfaction with the quality of nursing care. National Library of
Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1002%2Fnop2.237

Navales, J., Jallow, A., Lai, C., Liu, C., and Chen, S. (2021). Relationship between quality of nursing qork
life and uniformed nurses’ attitudes and practices related to COVID-19 in the Philippines: A
cross-sectional study. PubMed Central. https://doi.org/10.3390%2Fijerph18199953