Testing a healthcare provider–patient communicative relationship quality model of pharmaceutical care in hospitals

Background Patient-centeredness and participatory care is increasingly regarded as a proxy for high-quality interpersonal care. Considering the development of patient-centeredness and participatory care relationship model in pharmacist–patient domain, it is of great significance to explore the mechanism of how pharmacist and patient participative behaviors influence relationship quality and patient outcomes. Objective To validate pharmacist–patient relationship quality model in Chinese hospitals. Setting: Four tertiary hospitals in 2017. Methods The provision of pharmaceutical care was investigated. A cross-sectional questionnaire survey covering different constructs of communicative relationship quality model was conducted and the associations among pairs of the study constructs were explored. Based on the results of confirmatory factor analysis, path analysis was conducted to validate the proposed communicative relationship quality model. Main outcome measure Model fit indicators including Tucker–Lewis index (TLI), comparative fit index (CFI), root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) and weighted root mean square residual(WRMR). Results There were 589 patients included in our study. The final path model had an excellent fit (TLI = 0.98, CFI = 0.98, RMSEA = 0.05; WRMR = 1.06). HCP participative behavior/patient-centeredness (β = 0.79, p < 0.001) and interpersonal communication (β = 0.13, p < 0.001) directly impact the communicative relationship quality. But patient participative behavior was not a predictor of either communicative relationship quality or patient satisfaction. Conclusion HCP participative behavior/patient-centeredness and interpersonal communication are positively related to relationship quality, and relationship quality is mediator between HCP participative behavior and interpersonal communication with patient satisfaction.