Aim: To analyse the structural associations among job characteristics, organizational justice, work engagement and nursing care quality in Chinese nurses.
Background: Nursing care quality helps ensure patient safety, which are core concerns. The explicit relationships among the study's variables from a management perspective can help hospital managers to implement effective strategies to improve nursing care quality.
Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted to investigate the relationships among the variables in 1,615 nurses in eight Chinese tertiary hospitals. Structural equation modelling was used to test a proposed model of these relationships.
Results: The scores of job characteristics, organizational justice, work engagement and nursing care quality were 3.55 ± 0.41, 3.84 ± 0.77, 4.67 ± 1.30 and 3.42 ± 0.70. Job characteristics and organizational justice had direct effects on nursing care quality. Work engagement mediated the relationship of nursing care quality with job characteristics and organizational justice. The final model explained 24% of nursing care quality.
Conclusion: The results provide a better understanding of the associations between the study's variables. Perceived job characteristics and organizational justice can improve nursing care quality through work engagement.
Implications for nursing management: Reconfiguring work design to strengthen nurses' positive perceptions of job characteristics and organizational justice can enhance nursing care quality.
Keywords: job characteristics; nursing care quality; organizational justice; work engagement.
© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.