Date of Award

7-2018

Document Type

DNP Project

Degree Name

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP)

Department

Nursing

First Advisor

Jochebed Bea Ade-Oshifogun

Second Advisor

Hibanje Chisonga

Abstract

Nurses are expected to provide quality care to patients, and work demands in the health care system are increasing. An increased turnover in nursing staff was observed in a southwest Michigan community hospital, and the possibility of burnout contributing to this turnout was proposed. The purpose of this scholarly project was to evaluate the significance and level of perceived burnout in nurses who work the 12-hour shift compared to those who work the eight-hour shift, to investigate the relationship between nurse-to-patient ratios and burnout, and to compare burnout levels between nurses working day versus night shifts. This project utilized a cross-sectional approach with convenience sampling of nurses from the hospital acute care units. After receiving approval from the Andrews University IRB, the project manager obtained survey data from nurses using the MBI questionnaire between August 2017 and March 2018. The survey was comprised of 22 questions distributed via online and paper format. Three domains of the MBI were tested: emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and decreased personal achievement. Data analysis was completed using ANOVA and MANOVA statistics (p = 0.5).

A total of 118 nurses participated in the survey. Ninety-seven nurses worked eight-hour shifts, and 94 nurses worked 12-hour shifts. Forty-eight nurses worked night shifts, and 61 nurses had a heavy patient load (5-8 patients per shift). The majority of nurses (58) had between one and five years of work experience. Though mean scores were very close to the burnout threshold, none of the groups’ scores were significant for burnout. However, a significant difference was observed in the domain of emotional exhaustion between day shift and night shift nurses, F (1, 116) = 3.93, p = .05. Nurses who had a higher patient load (5-8 patients) also conveyed higher but not significant levels of emotional exhaustion. Though MBI scores did not reveal burnout in nurses working in this southwest Michigan hospital, emotional exhaustion was a significant factor with day shift nurses. Higher patient loads should be further assessed for their potential impact on nurses’ work and burnout.

DOI

https://dx.doi.org/10.32597/dnp/1

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

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