Occupational stress and mental health among nurses in a medical intensive care unit of a general hospital in Bandar Abbas in 2013

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Abstract

Background:

Many nurses have reported experiencing high levels of occupational stress in their work environment. Stress, as an outcome of stressful workplaces and tasks, affects nursing behavior in hospital wards. The objectives of this research were to determine the prevalence of occupational stress and mental health problems in nurses in the intensive care unit (ICU) at Shahid Mohammadi Hospital in Bandar Abbas in 2013 and to determine the relationship between occupational stress and mental health.

Methods:

This cross-sectional study was conducted in 2013 on all of the nurses working in ICU at Shahid Mohammadi Hospital located in Bandar Abbas, Iran. Seventy-two nurses were selected as the population for this study, and all of them were female. Two questionnaires were used in this study, i.e., General Health Questionnaire-28 (GHQ-28) for assessing mental health and an occupational stress test for assessing job stress. Furthermore, the relationship between occupational stress and mental health was examined. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), independent samples t-test, and Pearson’s product-moment correlation test were used to analyze the data.

Results:

High and moderate levels of occupational stress were experienced by 83.9% and 10.7% of ICU nurses, respectively. The prevalence of mental disorders, somatic symptoms, anxiety, social dysfunction, and depression were 58.9, 60.7, 62.5, 71.4, and 10.7%, respectively. The findings of the independent samples t-test showed that somatic symptoms had significant relationships with age and working experience (p = 0.01). According to the independent samples t-test, there were no significant differences between somatic symptoms and working different shifts (p > 0.05).

Conclusions:

There was a high prevalence of occupational stress among ICU nurses. There was a significant relationship between occupational stress and mental health. Future interventions are needed to codify a comprehensive health program in this field to reduce occupational stress and enhance nurses’ levels of mental health.

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Most cited references 24

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The presence of resilience is associated with a healthier psychological profile in intensive care unit (ICU) nurses: results of a national survey.

Meredith Mealer, Jacqueline Jones, Julia T. Newman … (2012)

ICU nurses are repeatedly exposed to work related stresses resulting in the development of psychological disorders including posttraumatic stress disorder and burnout syndrome. Resilience is a learnable multidimensional characteristic enabling one to thrive in the face of adversity. In a national survey, we sought to determine whether resilience was associated with healthier psychological profiles in intensive care unit nurses. Surveys were mailed to 3500 randomly selected ICU nurses across the United States and included: demographic questions, the Posttraumatic Diagnostic Scale, Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, Maslach Burnout Inventory and the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale. Overall, 1239 of the mailed surveys were returned for a response rate of 35%, and complete data was available on a total of 744 nurses. Twenty-two percent of the intensive care unit nurses were categorized as being highly resilient. The presence of high resilience in these nurses was significantly associated with a lower prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder, symptoms of anxiety or depression, and burnout syndrome (<0.001 for all comparisons). In independent multivariable analyses adjusting for five potential confounding variables, the presence of resilience was independently associated with a lower prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder (p<0.001), and a lower prevalence of burnout syndrome (p<0.001). The presence of psychological resilience was independently associated with a lower prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder and burnout syndrome in intensive care unit nurses. Future research is needed to better understand coping mechanisms employed by highly resilient nurses and how they maintain a healthier psychological profile. Copyright Â© 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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Occupational stress, job characteristics, coping, and the mental health of nurses.

G. Mark Lathrop, Lorraine P. Smith (2012)

This study investigated the relationships between job characteristics and coping in predicting levels of anxiety and depression in nurses. The study was based on current theories of occupational stress, and predictors included job demands, social support, decision authority and skill discretion control, effort, over-commitment, rewards, and ways of coping. It was predicted that job demands, extrinsic effort, over-commitment, and negative coping behaviours would be positively associated with depression and anxiety, and social support, rewards, decision authority, skill discretion control, and positive coping would be negatively associated with depression and anxiety. Participants were 870 nurses, who responded to a bulk mail sent randomly to 4,000 nurses from the south of England. The results showed that job demands, extrinsic effort, and over-commitment were associated with higher levels of anxiety and depression. Social support, rewards, and skill discretion were negatively associated with mental health problems. Few interactions were found between the variables. Coping behaviours significantly added to the explanation of variance in anxiety and depression outcomes, over and above the use of demand-control-support, and effort-reward factors alone. The results from the study demonstrated the importance of coping factors in work-stress research, in accordance with the multi-factorial premise of transactional stress models. It is argued that multi-factor research is needed to help develop effective organizational interventions. © 2011 The British Psychological Society.

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Increased prevalence of post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms in critical care nurses.

Meredith Mealer, Barbara Rothbaum, Yvonne Shelton … (2007)

Intensive care unit (ICU) nurses work in a demanding environment where they are repetitively exposed to traumatic situations and stressful events. The psychological effects on nurses as a result of working in the ICU are relatively unknown. To determine whether there is an increased prevalence of psychological symptoms in ICU nurses when compared with general nurses. We surveyed ICU and general nurses from three different hospitals (n=351) and then surveyed ICU nurses throughout the metropolitan area (n=140). In both cohorts of nurses, we determined the prevalence of symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), anxiety, and depression using validated survey instruments. Within our hospital system, 24% (54/230) of the ICU nurses tested positive for symptoms of PTSD related to their work environment, compared with 14% (17/121) of the general nurses (p=0.03). ICU nurses did not report a greater amount of stress in their life outside of the hospital than general nurses. There was no difference in symptoms of depression or anxiety between ICU and general nurses. In the second survey of ICU nurses from our metropolitan area, 29% (41/140) of the respondents reported symptoms of PTSD, similar to our first cohort of ICU nurses. ICU nurses have an increased prevalence of PTSD symptoms when compared with other general nurses. These results may increase awareness of these symptoms in nurses and lead to future interventions that improve their mental health and job satisfaction and help retain ICU nurses in their profession.

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Author and article information

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Electron Physician

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Electron Physician

Journal ID (publisher-id): Electronic physician

Title: Electronic Physician

Publisher: Electronic physician

ISSN (Electronic): 2008-5842

Publication date Collection: July 2015

Publication date (Electronic): 20 July 2015

Volume: 7

Issue: 3

Pages: 1108-1113

Affiliations

[1 ]Lecturer of Occupational Health Engineering, Center for Social Determinants in Health Promotion, Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences, Bandar-Abbas, Iran

[2 ]Professor of Occupational Health Engineering, Faculty of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

[3 ]M.Sc. of Biostatistics, Center for Social Determinants in Health Promotion, Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences, Bandar-Abbas, Iran

[4 ]Ph.D. Candidate of Occupational Health Engineering, Faculty of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

[5 ]B.Sc. of Public Health, North Khorasan University of Medical Sciences, Bojnurd, Iran

Author notes

Corresponding author: Ali Salehi Sahl Abadi, Ph.D. Candidate of Occupational Health Engineering, Faculty of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, PO Box: 141556446, Tehran, Iran. Tel: +98.2188951390, Fax: +98.2188954781, Email: asalehi529@ 123456gmail.com

iThenticate screening: June 23, 2015, English editing: July 03, 2015, Quality control: July 08, 2015

Article

Publisher ID: epj-07-1108

DOI: 10.14661/2015.1108-1113

PMC ID: 4574696

PubMed ID: 26388976

SO-VID: 5b469391-5448-4aa3-a78d-b097eddeda72

License:

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.

Occupational stress and mental health among nurses in a medical intensive care unit of a general hospital in Bandar Abbas in 2013

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China Occupational Medicine

Most cited references 24

The presence of resilience is associated with a healthier psychological profile in intensive care unit (ICU) nurses: results of a national survey.

Occupational stress, job characteristics, coping, and the mental health of nurses.

Increased prevalence of post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms in critical care nurses.

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