Given the increasing challenges in health care services, managerial work requires indispensable management competencies. Competent managers are one of the key contributors to effective and efficient health care service delivery (Pihlainen et al., 2016). According to the systematic review of Wong and Cummings (2007), positive nursing leadership behaviours are significantly related to patient outcomes, including increased patient satisfaction and reduced adverse events.

Aim: To explore nurse managers' perceived importance of competencies for their current job at different levels and the associated factors. Background: Little work to date has explored the perceived importance of competencies in nursing leadership and management or considered the related factors in the Taiwan healthcare context. Methods: Data collected from a previous large study comprising a cross-sectional web-based survey were analysed. Kruskal-Wallis test, two-sided Fisher exact test and multiple linear regression models were used for statistics analysis. Results: The mix of three skills in Katz's model indicated that human skills were equally important in all three managerial levels. Of the 23 competencies, effective communication and political astuteness were rated by nurse managers at all levels as the highest-scored (M = 4.88, SD = 0.34) and lowest-scored competency (M = 3.92, SD = 0.78), respectively. Managerial level was a significant predictor of the perceived importance of competency. Conclusions: Relationship-based competencies were prominent in the perceived importance of competencies among nurse managers at different levels. Managerial hierarchy influences the relative importance of the different managerial competencies.Implications for Nursing Management: This study's results provide the talent strategy framework required for improving the competencies of nurse managers at all levels.

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Background: Preprocedural anxiety is a common problem in patients undergoing surgery or an invasive examination. This study investigated listening to self-selected music on anxiety and physiological responses in patients before gastroscopy. Aim: The study was to explore the effects of listening to music on anxiety and physiological responses before gastroscopy. Methods: A pretest–posttest control group design was conducted, in which patients scheduled for gastroscopy in a medical center located in Taipei, Taiwan, were enrolled. The participants were randomly assigned to the music group (n = 100) or the control group (n = 100) by drawing lots. The music group listened to self-selected music with earphones for 15 min before the procedure. In contrast, the control group rested for 15 min. Blood pressure (BP), heart rate, respiratory rate, and anxiety level were measured immediately before and after the music intervention. Results: After adjusting for covariates, anxiety (P = 0.003) and respiratory rate (P = 0.01) significantly decreased in the music group than in the control group. However, no statistical difference in BP and heart rate changes was observed between the two groups. Listening to music could effectively reduce anxiety in patients who believed in the relaxing effects of music. Conclusion: Listening to self-selected music could effectively reduce the patients’ anxiety and respiratory rate before gastroscopy, which could be recommended as a routine practice to alleviate patients’ anxiety and physiological arousal before gastroscopy.