Impact of Knowledge Transfer on Empowerment among Personnel of Teaching Hospitals: A Cross-Sectional Study

Background. The value of services in healthcare institutions such as hospitals is created by leveraging the knowledge, skills, and experiences of their healthcare staff. Therefore, knowledge transfer is necessary to empower the employees in the hospital. Since few studies have explored the impact of knowledge transfer on the empowerment of hospital employees, this study aimed to investigate the impact of knowledge transfer and its components on employees' empowerment in Qazvin teaching hospitals. Methods. In this descriptive-analytic and cross-sectional study, 330 teaching hospital staff members of Qazvin University of Medical Sciences were investigated between February 2020 and May 2020. The required data were collected using the Knowledge Transfer Questionnaire (De-Castro, et al., 2008) and the Empowerment Questionnaire (Spreitzer, 1992). The data were analyzed using the correlation method and structural equation analysis (SEM) as well as using SPSS-22 and AMOS software. Results. There was a direct relationship between the dimensions of knowledge transfer and personnel empowerment (P<0.001), and all examined dimensions were above average. Moreover, the dimensions of knowledge transfer also had a significant impact on personnel empowerment. Regarding the fit of the model, the values of GFI, CFI, and NFI indices were obtained above 0.90. In addition, the RMSEA index was 0.074, which indicated the good fit of the model. Conclusion. In summary, the staff's empowerment level was enhanced through the knowledge transfer. Therefore, it was recommended that the hospital managers should improve the level of workers' empowerment by implementing effective strategies, such as providing training courses for the employees.