By Rose O. Sherman, EdD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN
When discussing Patient Experience Scores with nurse managers, the conversation can become emotional. Many leaders feel they are held accountable when numerous variables beyond nursing care impact how patients view their experience. Consider the following story told by an Emergency Department manager:
I was recently asked to attend a meeting to discuss our patient experience scores in the ED. We are significantly below our corporate benchmark, but on the other hand, we have the busiest ED in our health system with wait times that frequently exceed six hours. The situation was presented as if it were exclusively a nursing problem. Our volumes are high; we are doing everything possible to fast-track patients, but they continue to arrive, and I’m concerned that the changes to Medicaid and potential loss of insurance for many in our community will only exacerbate the situation. I spend my day thanking patients and families for their patience and updating them as to when they will be seen. They are not happy, and neither are we about the situation. By the time they leave, many feel angry and demonstrate their frustration on their HCAHPS surveys.
This manager is not alone in her frustration. I hear this at virtually every workshop session that I present – our patients expect a Ritz-Carlton experience, and this is almost impossible given our staffing and capacity constraints. Nurse managers desperately want new tools and strategies. Nurse leaders also want to clearly understand what they can influence and what they can’t.
I was therefore interested in a new Press Ganey Whitepaper on the Press Ganey patient-experience-2025. Press Ganey now processes more patient experience data than any other vendor, so an analysis of their data can offer helpful insights, and this report certainly did that.
Five Key Takeaways for Nurse Leaders
- Trends indicate that patient experience scores keep improving in ambulatory settings but continue to lag in inpatient settings. Press Ganey notes that the physical environment is an important part of the care experience. Quiet care environments and practices that minimize disturbing patients promote rest. And clean environments give patients confidence in hygiene and infection prevention practices. They see AI’s most powerful contributions is its potential to enable humanity—amplifying empathy, connection, and care. By delivering real-time insights and recommendations, AI helps caregivers anticipate needs, respond swiftly, and strengthen their connection with patients.
- Teamwork is the top driver of patient experience scores in inpatient settings. One of the strongest signals from Press Ganey data is the importance of teamwork in building patients’ trust in caregivers and their confidence in the system. Across all settings of care, “care team worked well together” is a key driver of Likelihood to Recommend. In the eyes of the patient, good teamwork is characterized by well-informed care teams, well-coordinated care, clarity of communications, and respectful interactions between team members and with patients. These behaviors inspire trust, reinforce a sense of safety, and drive lasting loyalty.
- Patients’ perceptions of safety are among the most powerful predictors of loyalty and intent to recommend. Patient experience starts with safety. Today’s patients are highly attuned to the signals—both subtle and and overt—that impact their sense of safety. When that sense is compromised, trust breaks down. Cleanliness as an example provides a visual cue on the safety of care settings. Patients equate clean environments with hygiene, infection control, and quality of care. Practices like bedside shift report, nurse leader visits, and intentional interval rounding are most effective when grounded in harm prevention and trust-building vs. score improvement.
- Patients with unplanned admissions rate their patient experiences significantly lower than those with planned admissions. Patients with unplanned admissions consistently report the lowest experience scores and are 16% less likely to recommend the hospital. These stays often begin without warning, leaving patients unprepared and facing more uncertainty. Conversely, planned admissions typically allow for greater preparation and predictability, resulting in better coordination, clearer communication, and higher patient confidence. The gap is widest on medical units and observation units.
- To patients, digital, clinical, and follow-up interactions are all part of one journey and considered in how they evaluate their patient experiences. From the moment a patient decides to seek care, their experience is shaped by a series of interactions—including online search, office staff, and digital tools. Getting it right means aligning every part of the journey and every person involved. This finding confirms what nurse leaders know to be true – the patient experience is impacted by many factors beyond the nursing care received.
This deep dive into their own data by Press Ganey can help nurse leaders to build better strategies to improve the patient experience. The importance of promoting strong teamwork is clear as is a need for a clean environment. So many health systems have cut back on support services such as environmental management. Nurse leaders tell me that garbage cans are overflowing and floors are often not cleaned for days. This comes with a cost relative to the patient experience that all leaders must acknowledge.
Understanding the inherent risk factors from an unplanned admission are also important to consider and can help organizations focus their efforts on units that are naturally more problematic. Nurse managers should share withe staff the importance of perceptions of safety relative to intent to recommend. Nurses today often discuss with patients when their units are short staffed without considering how this could impact perceptions of safety.
In this report, Press Ganey also reiterates how the employee experience and patient experience are two sides of the same coin. At their best it is noted, PX and EX create a flywheel effect—each reinforcing the other to build momentum behind the values, behaviors, and practices that earn and sustain confidence and trust.
© emergingrnleader.com 2025
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