How can a social capital framework guide managers to develop positive nurse relationships and patient outcomes?

Aim: To examine how social capital could be a mediating factor through which managers' leadership positively influences relationships with nurses and quality patient outcomes.

Background: The relationship between leadership, what managers do and optimal outcomes for patients are well established. What is not yet clear is an understanding about specific mechanisms by which managers' leadership builds social capital to foster cohesive team relationships and quality patient outcomes.

Acknowledging complexity: critically analyzing context to understand interdisciplinary research.

It is timely to develop improved understandings about strengthening interdisciplinary contexts to guide effective and quality healthcare research; contexts in which health and social issues occur do not recognize disciplinary boundaries. Similar to the notion of "partnership", the terms multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary are in danger of becoming conceptually indistinct and thus of limited usefulness for researchers, practitioners and teams. In this paper, we review basic concepts related to cross-disciplinary relationships as well as common arguments for and against interdisciplinary research.