A Health Care Managers’ Perspectives on the Sources of Evidence in Evidence-Based Hospital Management Qualitative Study in Iran

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Evidence-based management (EBMgt) has beendeveloped as a management framework for improving the qualityof management decisions. To use that, we need to identify thesource of evidence in decision-making. Therefore, the purpose ofthis study was to identify the sources of evidence in managinghospitals.METHODS: Qualitative methods were used to explore the sourcesof evidence and to identify hospital managers’ attitudes towardsevidence-based management. A series of semi-structured interviews(n=48), with a purposive sample of 48 participants, were conductedin 2016. Also, four focus group discussions (FGDs) wereconducted with health managers and specialists in the field ofmanagement. A questionnaire was used for collection ofdemographic characteristics and managers’ perspectives.RESULTS: Six main themes emerged from the interviewsincluding: scientific and research evidence, facts and informationof hospital, political-social development plans, managers’professional expertise and ethical-moral evidence. Also, the resultsshowed that the majority of participants believed to use theevidence-based hospital management (95.83%).CONCLUSIONS: Our study suggested that a full evidence-basedhospital manager someone who is using all the sources of evidencefor making hospital decisions. Using hexagon of evidence sources,managers can identify the best available evidence for hospitaldecisions and to make the best decision in the process of evidence-based decision making.