Occupational Stress and its Management among Nurses at St. Dominic Hospital, Akwatia, Ghana

Background: The prevalence of occupational stress among nurses is an endemic problem. Identifying the causes and its management in any healthcare institution is vital for successful interventions.

Method and material: A purposive sampling technique and a self-administered questionnaire were used to select 73 nurses from the nursing and midwifery department in the Hospital. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data.

Results: The study found out that the major causes of stress identified by the nurses were inadequate motivation (98.6%), inadequate staffing levels (91.8%), handling a large number of patients alone (83.6%), lack of break during shift (82.2%) and nursing difficult patients (71.3%). The major occupational stress management strategies used sometimes were going on break (60%), meditation (51.6%), exercises (64.1%) and relaxation (74.3%). There was significant association between department of work and types of stress experienced (pvalue< 0.05). There was significant relationship between age and the type of stress experienced (p-value<0.05) for the physical and emotional type of stressors. This study also revealed that there were significant association (pvalue< 0.05) between years of experience, salary and physical and emotional stressors respectively.

Conclusion: Occupational stress (physical, emotional and psychological) was statistically significantly associated with the department a nurse is. Nurses’ executives and hospital management should help create an adequate stress-free work environment for nurses. Nurses should be provided opportunities for learning a multitude of stress management strategies to improve their performance.

Author(s):

Adzakpah Godwin, Laar Alexander Suuk and Fiadjoe Harrison Selorm

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