الفهرس 
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Abstract
Accreditation can play an important role in communicating quality information and increasing efficiency in the health sector. When sufficiently widespread, accreditation serves to increase the overall quality of the health sector by providing both information on quality and feedback on structures necessary to achieve quality in a form that promotes benchmarking and internal organization improvements. Therefore, accreditation requires agreement upon standards, criteria, and policies among participating parties. Standards and criteria for accreditation are generally developed through consensus among healthcare providers and other stakeholders such as medical associations, Ministries of Health, and nongovernmental organizations.The aim of this study was to measure to what extent nursing departments at different hospitals are fulfilling the accreditation criteria. This operational study was carried out in sixteen hospitals representing four sectors Ministry of Health, Health Insurance Organization, Teaching Hospitals, and Private Hospitals. The study sample consisted of two different groups. The first jury group served validation of the developed accreditation criteria, and consisted of 33 members, of which 21 were from academic staff in nursing faculties, and 12 nursing leaders and quality management specialties in the Ministry of Health. The second group included two subgroups; the first included 31 nursing directors and their assistants from the sixteen hospitals, and served in assessment of fulfillment of accreditation criteria in their hospitals. The second included five of the nursing supervisors in each of these hospitals, making a total of 80 subjects. Three tools designed by the researcher were used for data collection, a validity form, an audit form, and a self-administered questionnaire sheet. The main study findings were as follows:Jury group agreement upon the content validity of the designed accreditation criteria was high and ranged between 78.8% and 100% for vision and mission.Most of the examined criteria were partially or fully fulfilled in the studied hospitals, particularly those related to nursing director qualifications and experience.
Statistically significant differences were revealed among the four sectors regarding scores or fulfillment of criteria: The MOH hospitals had the highest scores of fully met criteria of standard 10.The HIO hospitals had statistically significantly lower scores of totally met criteria in standards 7, 17, and 18. The teaching hospitals had the lowest mean scores of fully met criteria in standards 9, 10, 11, and 13.Private hospitals’ had lower scores of fully met criteria in standards 7 and 15. Concerning total fulfillment of criteria of standards, teaching hospitals had the highest scores of partially met, whereas MOH hospitals had the highest scores of fully met standards (p=0.02). There were generally high percentages of satisfactory knowledge among nurse leaders regarding accreditation pre-requisites, and benefits, while knowledge about definition and preparation was less satisfactory.
However, the majority of nurses’ leaders in the four hospitals had total satisfactory knowledge about accreditation, with no statistically significant differences among them.
It is concluded that validated accreditation criteria were developed, and their application is possible given the high fulfillment of these standards in the study settings, and the high levels of related knowledge among nurse leaders.
It is recommended that the developed accreditation be used by various hospitals to analyze to what extent they are ready for accreditation, and in training and staff development. They could also be used in the context of a national plan for accreditation. The factors underlying the significant differences among various sectors need to be investigated. Knowledge about positive impact and assets of accreditation for the health care professionals needs to be fostered. Further research is proposed to assess the impact of serial application of the developed accreditation criteria on nurses’ knowledge about accreditation and on the fulfillment of these criteria.