A survey on the medical interns’ attitudes toward the interactions between interns and nurses in teaching hospitals

Background: Effective communication among healthcare professionals, particularly physicians and nurses, is paramount in delivering top-notch patient care. Therefore, it is imperative for medical interns aspiring to become doctors to gain experience in this crucial aspect of healthcare. Interns should be able to provide feedback on the quality of communication within their team in a constructive and nonjudgmental manner. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the attitude of medical interns toward the interactions between interns and nurses in Teaching Hospitals. Materials and Methods: In this cross-sectional study, medical interns were surveyed using a questionnaire developed by the researchers. The validity of the questionnaire was confirmed by experts using the content validity confirmation method, and its reliability was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha. The data collected were analyzed using SPSS v26 software. Results: The study found no significant relationship between interns’ attitudes toward the interactions with nurses based on gender ( P = 0.249), grade point average ( P = 0.758), previous university education ( P = 0.942), or the duration past of internship period ( P = 0.373). However, a statistically significant difference was observed in interns’ attitudes toward the quality of interactions based on the teaching department ( P = 0.001) and the teaching hospital ( P = 0.013). Conclusion: It appears that conducting training courses on professional communication skills and revising the policies of teaching department to enhance the involvement of interns in the treatment process with the assistance of nurses could be an effective solution to address the issues in the interactions between interns and nurses.