Development of a Self-Administered Questionnaire Assessing Healthcare Provider Experience in the Hospital Work Environment

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: In healthy workplaces, behaviors are guided by people-centered values and supported by human resources management practices. However, engagement is a broader gauge than job satisfaction of an employee's overall work experience-and one that researchers increasingly are connecting to the patient experience. Leadership has been identified within the Quadruple Aim in the delivery of healthcare: improving the experience of providing care. Provider experience can be defined as the ability to find joy and meaning within one's contributions to their work within healthcare. However, current methods used to quantify this metric focus on the end results such as absences instead of identifying the key determinants leading to a decrease in work engagement. This project seeks to develop a cross-occupational healthcare provider experience survey. METHODS: This study employed a literature review to identify key aspects of the healthcare provider experience, followed by qualitative interpretive descriptive methods designed to explore these dimensions. Purposive and snowball sampling recruited 24 healthcare providers (eg, nurses, allied health professionals, and physicians) and 5 administrators working at a major Canadian academic hospital in 2022 and 2023. Each provider participated in a semistructured interview. Two independent reviewers used thematic analysis and iterative descriptive methods to analyze interviews. Reviewers met regularly to discuss analysis and achieve consensus. RESULTS: The literature review revealed multiple domains with themes of caring for patients, providing excellent care, the role of the organization, and the importance of well-supported teams, work-life balance, safety culture, and organization. There was no large difference between occupational groups with differences existing largely due to different work settings and types and levels of patient contact. The importance of workplace interpersonal support, feelings of duty, and a strong desire to help patients were highlighted as contributing to positive experiences. Participants consistently identified these as the most important factors in their experience and satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS: To our knowledge, there is currently no validated score that focuses on provider experience in the hospital work environment across multiple occupational groups, as most studies either use generic quality of life tools, which are not specific to one occupation, or use tools that are designed for a specific health setting. Our work adds to previous literature by laying the foundation for a cross-occupational tool designed specifically for healthcare providers. These findings point to a critical need to develop a specific tool to assess and compare healthcare provider experiences to identify and amplify best practices.