PURPOSE: This study was conducted to explore clinical nurses' experience of positive organizational culture in order to provide data for effective strategies of acquisition and retention of competent nurses. METHODS: In this qualitative study, interviews with four focus groups of four to six nurses, 19 in total, were held. Compositional factors in groups included clinical experience, age, work place, and position. Interviews proceeded until data were saturated. RESULTS: Fifteen sub-themes, categorized into six themes, emerged. Positive organizational culture themes included "Helping nurses to be organization members", "Allowing nurses to communicate with one another", "Helping nurses take an initiative to lead organization", "Having competent leader take charge of organization", "Enabling nurses to achieve organizational changes", and "Leading nurses to accomplish organizational performance." CONCLUSION: Results indicate that positive organizational culture is related to increases in occupational satisfaction and decreases in turnover through supportive organizational culture which makes it possible to reinvest expenses required for training new members to promoting quality growth in the organization and the prestige of professional nurses. In order to improve occupational satisfaction and sustained growth in nurses, it is necessary to provide nurses with positive work environments and require members to make active efforts leading to strategic changes.
Focus Groups ; Organizational Culture* ; Workplace

The purposes of this study were (1) to understand how customers trade off one attribute against another when they choose a pizza restaurant, (2) to compare the importance of individual attributes with their relative importance and (3) to compare customers' brand choice patterns with the prediction of pizza restaurant operators. Empirical data for this study were collected from the customers (n = 307) and operators (n = 273) of four famous pizza franchise restaurants in Korea, Pizza Hut, Mister Pizza, Domino's Pizza and Pizza Mall. The attributes and attribute levels for the hypothetical profiles were decided from the focus group discussion. A total of 16 profiles was selected from fractional factorial designs. The SPSS conjoint procedure was used to calculate utility scores and simulate profiles. The overall group statistics showed the relative importance of all attributes compared with one other. Taste was the most important attribute (32.48%) in choosing a pizza restaurant, followed by service (21.87%), atmosphere (17.23%), price (15.17%) and speed of delivery (13.26%). There was a difference between the customers' ratings of the importance of the individual attributes and the ranking of the same attributes' relative importance as derived from the conjoint analysis. The operators rated service (26.54%) as also being important, as well as taste (27.76%), in choosing a pizza restaurant. The rankings of relative importance for pizza taste, service and price were statistically different in the customers' and operators' data (p < .001, p < .01, p < .05). Operators who want to differentiate themselves from their competitors should make decisions based on an increased understanding of their customers' brand choice decision process and measure the hidden needs of their customers.
Atmosphere ; Focus Groups ; Korea ; Restaurants*

OBJECTIVE:This study was conducted to provide the fundamental information to prepare better strategies based on the experiences of occupational health care providers who are involved in the Government-funded subsidized occupational health programs for small scale industries. METHODS:The focus group methodology was used in this study.The data was collected using focus group interviews and analyzed in the framework of the Grounded theory method as mapped by Strauss and Corbin(1990). The subjects enrolled in this study included 20 occupational health care providers in the Government-funded subsidized occupational health program for the SSI;6 doctors and 14 nurses. RESULTS: We identified 69 concepts,28 sub-categories and 5 categories(Table 2).The categories were the Program's Goals, Various Services,Difficulties in Implement Services, Program Evaluation,and Suggestions for Alternative Plans. CONCLUSIONS: This program showed that autonomous health management ability has not changed although the possibility for small scale industries to start the health management arose by acknowledging the importance of the health management in the work-place. A successful program should provided a practical service that is planned by the characteristics and the requirements of the workers,a better service than the standard, more visiting times,and a trusting relationship among workers. The occupational health agency's quality and the health manager's specialty needs to be improved and the health manager's authority should be consolidated. An actively cooperative triangular relation among the Labor Department/KOSHA, service organizations, and the workplace is required.In addition,alternative plans were suggested.These included various programs for planning an autonomous service suitable for the quality of the workplaces,a model set-up suitable for the quality of the workplaces,and a role model set-up for the health manager.
Focus Groups* ; Occupational Health* ; Program Evaluation

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to investigate the reality, status of clinical nurses' emotional labor and the relationship with physical discomfort, burnout, depression and social support. METHODS: A thousand three hundred sixteen clinical nurses from 42 hospitals nationwide participated in this study. Questionnaires were developed for evaluating the reality and status of emotional labor of clinical nurses after interviewing focus groups and reviewing literatures. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, Pearson correlation coefficient. RESULTS: Ninety eight percent of nurses had answered having emotional labor and they experienced 82 times per year, 9.6 times during last a month which means they experience it every other day. The one who provoke emotional labor were patients, guardians, physicians, supervisor, and colleagues in sequence. Eighty percent of nurses had intention to leave their jobs after experiencing emotional labor. They were doing more surface acting than deep acting of emotional labor. CONCLUSION: Clinical nurses in Korea experienced excessively high level of emotional labor and delayed responding to clients' requests due to lack of time for caring each patient was revealed as one of the main causes of emotional labor.
Depression ; Focus Groups ; Humans ; Intention ; Korea

PURPOSE: The research aims to identify the roles of nurses at dementia clinics or geriatric hospitals to set their tasks. METHODS: This research has been conducted through literature review and focus group methodology. The field survey has been done for 195 nurses at 36 hospitals for the aged and dementia clinics from Oct. 9 to Oct. 28, 2006. RESULTS: The nurses were identified to play eight roles as clinical specialists, educators, researchers, counselors, consultants, collaborators, leaders, managers, and advocators. They were also known to implement 27 nursing tasks and 104 nursing activities. CONCLUSION: The findings of this research could provide a foundation for the nursing care work as well as become a practice guideline for the nurses, at these hospitals, to implement versatile roles and tasks.
Consultants ; Counseling ; Dementia* ; Focus Groups ; Humans ; Nursing ; Nursing Care ; Specialization

PURPOSE: The purpose of this research was to describe clonorchis sinensis infection experience in high risk populations living in riverside areas. The research question was "How do local residents perceive Clonorchiasis and how are they infected with the parasite". METHODS: Qualitative data were collected by focus group interviews with 16 participants from January to February, 2009. All the interviews were tape-recorded, transcribed, and analyzed by the content analysis method. RESULTS: Five main categories were conceptualized, which were "lacking in understanding of Clonorchiasis," "culture of the rural community," "life style," "recovering experience from infection" and "change of health behavior." CONCLUSION: The result of this study indicates that residents are infected with Clonorchiasis through interaction between individual and group risky factors. Therefore, it is important to develop effective health education programs on both individual and group levels to prevent infection with Clonorchiasis.
Clonorchiasis ; Clonorchis sinensis* ; Focus Groups ; Health Education ; Parasites ; Qualitative Research

PURPOSE: To date, no studies in the literature have examined student delivery of team-based learning (TBL) modules in the classroom. We aimed to assess student perceptions of a student-led TBL elective. METHODS: Third-year pharmacy students were assigned topics in teams and developed learning objectives, a 15-minute mini-lecture, and a TBL application exercise and presented them to student colleagues. Students completed a survey upon completion of the course and participated in a focus group discussion to share their views on learning. RESULTS: The majority of students (n=23/30) agreed that creating TBL modules enhanced their understanding of concepts, improved their self-directed learning skills (n=26/30), and improved their comprehension of TBL pedagogy (n=27/30). However, 60% disagreed with incorporating student-generated TBL modules into core curricular classes. Focus group data identified student-perceived barriers to success in the elective, in particular the development of TBL application exercises. CONCLUSION: This study provides evidence that students positively perceived student-led TBL as encouraging proactive learning from peer-to-peer teaching.
Comprehension ; Exercise ; Focus Groups ; Humans ; Learning* ; Students, Pharmacy ; Teaching

OBJECTIVE: This study was conducted to develop Internet health information evaluation checklist for medical professionals, web coordinators or managers, and general health information consumers. METHODS: Based on the literature review, evaluation model and prototype of evaluation checklist for Internet health information were developed. Expert group of Internet quality evaluation reviewed and refined original evaluation checklist through intensive focus group meetings. Revised web-based evaluation checklist for Internet health information was verified by medical professionals, web health information managers, and online members of National Health Insurance Corporation. RESULTS: The checklist for medical professionals consisted of 28 items to check 3 categories such as disease information, operation/procedure/examination information, and health/life pattern information. The checklist for health information managers focused on primary filtering of health information and consisted of 14 items. This can be utilized for automatic selection of health information in portal systems. The checklist for consumers consisted of 10 items and focused on convenience and utility of the evaluation tool for enhancing the acceptability. CONCLUSION: Continuous development and revision of health information evaluation checklist like this study can be useful way for improving Internet health information quality.
Checklist* ; Focus Groups ; Internet* ; National Health Programs ; Portal System

This study aimed to investigate undergraduate students' perceptions of the clinical induction program for dental undergraduates conducted at the DMIMS Deemed University, Sawangi-Meghe, India. Seventy-four third-year dental students who entered the clinical phase of the dental program in 2012 and attended all sessions of the clinical induction program were enrolled in this study. The students' perceptions of the clinical induction program were assessed through a Likert-scale questionnaire, focus group discussions, and individual interviews. Seventy-two students (97.3%) responded positively about the program, evaluating it as successful and making a few suggestions. Fifty-four students (73.0%) stated that the clinical tours and visits to the departments were the best feature of the program. Nine students (12.2%) suggested that the program should include interaction with their immediate seniors and that interactive activities should be included in the program. The induction program may help students become acclimated during the first few days of being introduced into the clinical phase of their education. It is crucial to ensure that students do not develop a negative attitude towards their educational program by facilitating their smooth transition to the clinical phase.
Education ; Focus Groups ; Humans ; India* ; Program Development ; Students, Dental

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to understand the clinical instructors' role experience in college of nursing. METHODS: Two focus group interviews were held with a total of 12 clinical instructors. All interviews were recorded and transcribed as they were spoken, and the collected data were analyzed using content analysis of Downe-Wamboldt(1992). RESULTS: Three themes and six subthemes were extracted from the analysis: 1) Getting recognition of special roles as a clinical instructor: 'Recognizing the role of clinical instructor for guiding student's individual practice goals', 'Recognizing helping and supporting roles for student's successful clinical practice', 2) Having difficulty in performing the role of clinical practice instructor: 'Difficulty from the lack of knowledge and experience as a clinical practice instructor', 'Difficulty from the gap between current clinical practice and purpose of clinical nursing practice', 3) Making efforts to overcome the difficulties as a clinical instructor and accomplishing personal development: 'Making efforts to acquire personal knowledge and experience', 'Making a chance to reflect on and grow up oneself'. CONCLUSION: Clinical instructors take an important part of clinical nursing education. To improve the quality of clinical nursing education, it is needed role reestablishment and institutional support for clinical instructors on the basis of the understanding of instructors' experience.
Education, Nursing ; Focus Groups ; Humans ; Nursing* ; Qualitative Research