BURNOUT, STRESS, AND THE OCCUPATIONAL HAZARDS OF NURSING WORK: A COMPARISON OF HOSPITAL NURSES AND AGENCY EMPLOYED NURSES.
Contributors: Union Institute (U.S.)
Published: 1996
Number of pages: 107
Subjects: Psychology, Industrial.; Psychology, Social.; Psychology, Clinical.; Health Sciences, Nursing.
Description: The purpose of this study was to examine and compare differences in levels of burnout among two groups of nurses that have direct, hands-on patient care. One group was employed by hospitals and provided bedside nursing care. Typically, they dealt not only with complex, multiple problems pertaining to patient care, but also with organizational bureaucracy and limited control over their schedules. The second group consisted of nurses employed by home health care agencies making intermittent home visits to their clients. They deal with clients directly, on an individual basis, though sometimes family members get involved, and they have a greater degree of flexibility in terms of both their schedules and the type of clients they visit.

This author hypothesized that there would be a higher level of burnout in the nursing group that provided services in hospital settings. The Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) was used to measure emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and sense of personal accomplishment for both of the groups. The author sought to identify burnout levels in the two groups, potentially leading to insight, prevention and treatment of burnout conditions.

Subjects for the study were volunteers between the ages of 23 and 57, from various hospitals and home care agencies in Southern California. They consisted of nurses who provided at least 30 hours of bedside care nursing or intermittent home visits to clients. Only employed female nurses were selected for the study. The number of participants were 26, from hospital settings and 27, from home health agencies.

Comparisons between nurses who were burned-out and those who were not were made by analysis of variance on all clinical sub scales of MBI. There were differences between the two groups in the directions as hypothesized. It was hypothesized that hospital nurses will have significantly higher levels of burnout than home health nurses arising from higher level of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and lower level of personal accomplishment.

Both groups were compared on all demographic variables. T-test comparisons were performed for age, years of experience, hours of work, and hours of patient care provided per week. Chi-square test were used to determine if there was a significant relation between ethnicity variables in the two groups. There were no significant differences between the two groups, in fact they were very similar on the demographic variables.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 57-10, Section: B, page: 6624.

Thesis (PH.D.)--THE UNION INSTITUTE, 1996.

School code: 1033.