Healthcare professionals’ perceptions about implementing accreditation as a strategy to improve healthcare quality and organisational performance: a cross-sectional survey study

Mohammad J. Alhawajreh, William J. Jackson, Audrey S. Paterson

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the healthcare professionals’ perceptions about the impact of accreditation as a strategy to improve the quality of healthcare services and organisational performance in public hospitals in Jordan.

Introduction

Worldwide, the healthcare industry faces unprecedented challenges from ageing populations, resource constraints, rising public awareness, and more recently, the challenges of a global pandemic [1,2]. These issues place a significant burden on healthcare systems while also reducing their quality and efficiency.

 Materials and methods

This cross-sectional survey was undertaken in public hospitals in Jordan. A sample of four cases was chosen according to the following criteria: Firstly, geographical and cultural locations, which represent Jordan’s three different geographical regions (North, Central, South), and the four largest governorates in the country in terms of high population concentrations, and these are urban areas with easy access.

Results

The study had a 74.4% response rate, with 372 out of 500 valid responses included in the data analysis. The data file did not contain any incomplete or missing questionnaires, as the web surveys were designed to notify participants of unanswered questions before they proceeded.

Discussion

To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study set out to investigate healthcare professionals’ perceptions about implementing accreditation as a strategy to improve the quality of healthcare services and organisational performance in Jordan’s public hospitals.

Conclusion

This study presents valuable insights into the perceptions of healthcare professionals toward accreditation and its impact in public hospitals in Jordan. The majority receive accreditation positively, recognizing its potential to improve the quality of healthcare and organizational performance.

Citation: Alhawajreh MJ, Jackson WJ, Paterson AS (2025) Healthcare professionals’ perceptions about implementing accreditation as a strategy to improve healthcare quality and organisational performance: a cross-sectional survey study. PLoS ONE 20(3): e0320664. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0320664

Editor: Maher Abdelraheim Titi, King Saud University Medical City, SAUDI ARABIA

Received: December 13, 2024; Accepted: February 23, 2025; Published: March 25, 2025

Copyright: © 2025 Alhawajreh et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Data Availability: All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting information file.

Funding: The author(s) received no specific funding for this work.

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.