Burnouts in the nursing sector
Burnouts in the nursing sector have been chosen as the contemporary subject to investigate. Nurses are the most numerous regulated healthcare professionals group in the sector, accounting for about half of all healthcare employees. Workplace circumstances that sanction and empower employees to maximize productivity and performance at work are recognized to increase employee retention and well-being. Nursing burnout is a common occurrence in the healthcare community and has become a typical concern in nursing. Everyone are stressed at times, but high stress encountered on a regular basis over an extended length of time can lead to burnout, which is characterized mostly by disengagement and emotional tiredness. This paper seeks to provide a report on counseling and stress reduction strategies that have a positive influence in reducing the levels of burnouts of nurses in clinical settings.
Literature review
The research topic divulges into an issue that has infected the healthcare industry for years, the fatigue and burnout in the nursing workforce which negatively influences the performance and competency of the nursing workforce. This research focuses on providing a report on the positive effect that stress reduction and counseling classes can have on reducing or minimizing the consequence of the stress on the nursing employees. This study has utilized literature from the several sources like Ovid online, PubMed, and WebMD. The investigation items used for the explore the study are burnout in nursing, healthcare stressors, stress reduction classes, workplace stress in the nursing workforce, counseling to lessen burnout, strategies to minimize burnout in healthcare, and lessening of fatigue in medical settings.
Workplace burnout
Work pressure and stress are associated with any profession. In some cases, the workload surpasses the limit that a single professional can take when there is a chronic imbalance in the daily workload of a qualified person and the competent capabilities of the individual coupled with the resources provided to the expert (Back, Steinhauser, Kamal, & Jackson, 2016). In case of a profession so physically and emotionally invested like excessive nursing workload often causes immense burnout and fatigue in the professionals. Johnstone and his co-workers have opined in their article that the exhaustion represents a disruption in the relationship between a professional and burnout in a profession causes the qualified person to detach himself from the job role and bring in elements like withdrawal, anger, and cynicism (Johnstone et al., 2016). According to the authors the impact of burnout the performance and mental health of the professionals are paramount like decreased competence, decreased production and compromised work quality, and these elements can be very detrimental to a profession like nursing.
Burnout elements in nursing workforce
In order to find a solution to any issue, the characterization of the source of the matter is pivotal, in the nursing workforce burnout and compassion fatigue is a very alarming yet a universal phenomenon. And there can be a lot of elements that can cause exhaustion in the nursing professionals. According to Van Bogaert, Clarke, Willems, and Mondelaers (2012), one of the major contributing factors behind the excessive burnout in the nursing professionals is the inadequate nursing staff and meager nurse-patient ratio in the healthcare facilities (Van Bogaert, Clarke, Willems, and Mondelaers, 2012). The patient-nurse proportions in the USA, especially in the rural areas are shockingly very low. In the US, the nursing shortage situation is still worsening as the nurses are required to be concerned about a patient number which is larger than what they can handle. As an outcome, fewer numbers of nurses are forced to work extended hours to recompense the deficiency condition which creates vast fatigue. This has been one of the effectual measures that have been assumed by all the hospitals across the United States. However, one of the important matters, in this case, is the fact that the hospitals have to employ more nurses within the healthcare entity.
According to an empirical research study by Johnstone et al.
According to an empirical research study by Johnstone et al., one of the most dangerous impacts of extreme burnout in the nurses is due to sheer exhaustion and the lack of sleep. This, in turn, affects the performance quality, competence, and efficiency of the nursing staff and it slowly impacts the mental health of the nurses as well (Johnstone et al., 2016).
Preventative strategies
In the recent years, there have been many instances when the nurses dealing with immense burnout had to resort to situations where the nurses had nervous breakdowns and withdrawal symptoms due to the negative impact on their physical and psychological well-being by the burnout stressors (Johnstone et al., 2016). Hence the need for preventative strategies is paramount, although there has not been enough effort in the past for characterizing a standard workplace procedure to deal with the burnout and exhaustion (Awa, Plaumann & Walter, 2010). Many of the previous literature has discussed the impact of different strategies on reducing the effects of burnout on the nurses; one of the most exceptional policies that have been addressed by the various authors had emphasized in the self-reflection and self-control strategies. However, in case of excessive burnout the strategy like self-control and escape-avoidance do not yield enough results due to the disappointment it facilitates in the nurses.
The need for person-directed and organization directed approaches
The need for person-directed and organization directed approaches have been highlighted ever since. In the article by Braunschneider and Heidi, the impact of both people directed and group-directed intervention activities have been seen to be conspicuously effective (Braunschneider & Heidi, 2013).
Counseling as a strategy
According to Rushton, Batcheller, Schroeder, and Donohue (2015), burnout can be characterized as a psychological syndrome that has the potential to impact the efficiency and competence of the professional and slowly impact the mental health of the profession. On the other hand, it facilitates emotions like anger, cynicism, helplessness, irritation, withdrawal and most of all disappointment and lack of self- worth (Rushton, Batcheller, Schroeder, & Donohue, 2015). In a profession like nursing, where the nurses are expected to have a compassionate and perseverant approach to care at all times, regardless of the physical or emotional exhaustion, these elements can ruin the career of the nurse and can jeopardize the health and safety of the patient as well. Similar to any other psychological syndrome, it can be stated that counseling can help the nursing individuals cope with the mental breakdown. According to McTiernan & McDonald (2014), philophonetic counseling is the radical addition to the coping strategies as it can help the nurse to build self-controlling emotional and cognitive approaches to build self-resilience (McTiernan & McDonald, 2014). As the psychological stressors are much more heightened in case of nursing burnout, the self-resilience can help the nurse deal with the stressors much more efficiently by initiating activities like meditation, emotional detachment and timeouts, which is evident from the matters that with the help of the counseling, it is possible to understand the current mental status of the individual nurses that can only be overcomed with the help of proper mode of communication and discussion sessions that can be done within the counseling sessions (Skovholt & Trotter-Mathison, 2011).
Stress reduction classes
As nursing is a profession that requires the qualified people to work within a team environment, group-based strategies to deal with the burnout can be much more useful in case of burnout prevention. As mentioned above, the psychological manifestation of the physical exhaustion makes the burnout issue so detrimental to the mental health and efficiency of the nurses, group-based reflective settings where the nurses can share their feelings and mirror on their concerns, the probability of effectiveness increases multiple folds (Skovholt & Trotter-Mathison, 2011). One of the main concerns with burnout impact is the self-imposed isolation that the victim struggles with, the group based stress reduction classes, where all the burnout victims can communicate and participate in stress reduction activities together can be extremely helpful. According to Qouta, Palosaari, Diab, & Punamäki, (2012), the stress reduction classes that incorporated elements of mindfulness strategy, intercommunication, meditation and cognitive therapies.
According to an empirical research by Fjorback and his co-authors
According to an empirical research by Fjorback and his co-authors, the stress reduction programs like mindfulness-based coping strategies are useful in case of preventing burnout impact while mindfulness-based cognitive therapies could avert depressive relapses to a large extent in case of nursing professionals (Fjorback, Arendt, Ørnbøl, Fink, & Walach, 2011). It is essential for all the healthcare units across the society to have the ability to deal with the excess pressure of the nurse. Proper forms of stress reduction training need to be incorporated into the nursing degree courses, which will allow the newly qualified nurse to deal with all sorts of challenges within the healthcare unit and departments. The stress training program will depend upon all types, and the work pressure of each kind of division within the healthcare unit each of the individual nurses will be deployed (Gunasingam, Burns, Edwards, Dinh, & Walton, 2015).
Proposed Study
Method and Design
The primary aim of the present research is to investigate the effect of various intervention steps that healthcare organizations or hospitals adapt to deal with stress and burnout among the nurses. Besides, the study has an objective of measuring efficient strategies that are taken up to deal with the stress of healthcare workers in distinct units within the healthcare entity.
The report given in the study will concentrate on the qualitative forms of design and techniques that will assist in issues pertaining establishment of the relationship between social teams that has the capability of instituting relationship between distinct strategies that are taken up to cope up with stress issues that are encountered by nurses. Previously conducted experiments linked to the intervention techniques taken up to deal with nurse stress level will be explored. Furthermore, the study will aim at collecting data directly from nurses that will assist in getting a thought about the possible circumstance of the nurse within the settings of the healthcare unit. The data will be gathered from several hospitals across the area. The healthcare entities must be those units that have assumed the policies to deal with burnout experience and stress of the nurses. The review for the examination will intend at gathering data from new and young nurses who have the probable anger of facing fatigue experiences. Informed consent from the participants will be collected to ensure that only reliable and genuine information and data will be gathered.
Sample and Setting
The sampling technique for the study will center on the nurses across all the critical healthcare units who have encountered a high degree of burnout experience and medical stress. The decisive factor and criterion for nursing burnout are chosen based on the fifth publication of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) that has been printed by the American Psychiatric Association. Aforementioned includes all the eight criteria written by the DSM-5 related to the burnout and stress experience for the nurses (American Psychiatric Association & American Psychiatric Publishing, 2014). In order to ensure that only reliable and related data linked to the research has been gathered, there will be particular inclusion and exclusion criteria that can be applied. The study will focus on experienced and aged nurse practitioners who deal with extended hours of duty within the place of work and more often than not, they deal with patients with critical conditions. Another group of nurses that will be chosen is those who have the capability of dealing with work pressure and multiple stresses. Such group of nurses offers solutions that are gained from intervention techniques that are adapted to deal with burnout experiences. In this case, the nurses who newly qualified for the position are excluded from the sample set since they have not yet collected or gained expertise connected to workplace burnout and stress. Furthermore, the study can also include nursing students because they have a possibility of facing fatigue experiences that can be a section of the first or preliminary stage in their professional development. The participants who will meet up the criterion discussed above will be welcomed for the survey analyzing (Hayes & Bonner, 2010).
Nevertheless, the researcher or investigator will concentrate on several online medical databases to gather data and information from secondary sources, which will assist them in focusing on reliable articles and journals and as well on relevant literature that applies to nurses' burnout experiences and interventions phases that can be implemented to reduce the impacts of stress and burnouts among the healthcare workers. PubMed, NCBI, CDU, Ovid, and Cochrane library are the databases that were utilized in this case. The journals that were published only after the year 2010 will be used and no older version will be chosen. The articles, which concentrate solely on the burnout experience and stress amongst the nurses and appropriate intervention phases are only included in the research study. The proper keywords that will be utilized including the nursing intervention, burnout, and nurse stress will ensure that just the consistent and reliable articles will be preferred for the burnout experience.
Data Collection
It is imperative that a researcher utilizes effective and efficient forms of data gathering techniques that give a chance for the investigators to efficiently collect data that is suitable to the subject of research. Orkin (2014) suggested that there are two kinds of data gathering techniques that can be used in dealing with the work of research which includes primary and secondary forms of data. The principal types of information are gathered from direct sources of the sample data and size of the study. Such kinds of data give a chance for the investigator to collect the recent data forms from the available sample size. It is very crucial that the researcher gathers data from a group of nurses who are experienced in more than ten years of experience in the relevant field of nursing (Westermann, Kozak, Harling, & Nienhaus, 2014). The sample size will be classified into two classes. The primary category will comprise of nurses who have been offered training to deal with burnout and nursing stress. The next group will consist of all the nurse practitioners who have not been under any intervention techniques. From here, the investigators will analyze the impacts of intervention techniques to overcome the effects and consequences of nursing burnouts. These will be possible through a comparison of data that has been gathered from both the mentioned groups.
Data Analysis Processes
In order to evaluate the outcome of the study, the data obtained require being critical analyzing and comparing. The data gathered by every group will be put down correctly to assess data and statistically analyze information that has been given by the respective nurse from the hospital selected. A qualitative technique of data analysis can be utilized in examining the result of data. The health conditions of both groups of nurses chosen are compared by use of distinct parameters that have been used in setting up the study questionnaires. On the other hand, it can highlight efficient measures that can be used by a female nurse in overcoming the consequences of burnouts. The outcome can also propose other intervention policies modifications to the already available steps that can be made to deal with stress and burnout matters among newly qualified and experienced nurses. Last but not least, the result can also be utilized as a reliable source of data for future research studies.
Summary
The study has capitulated indispensable information to validate the cause of this research. Burnouts are characterized as an element required in facilitating profoundly adverse professional effect on nursing experts though they have proven to be ineffective and vague strategies that have been used in the past. While the approach has been used in individual settings, the other literature has not evaluated the effectiveness of stress reduction and counseling plans in group-based and personal level. In fact, there have been several gaps that have been left by earlier studies on the positive impact group-based and personal stress reduction categories as a program for intervention. Therefore, the study seeks to judge the positive effect of the two strategies on minimizing the adverse impacts of burnouts on the nursing workforce. With these said, it is very crucial that a healthcare organization adopts suitable and enough training programs and measures that can assist both the newly qualified and experienced nurses in overcoming burnout experiences. Besides, it will help them in offering the best working capability to deal with all kinds of patients.
Conclusion
From the recent research studies, there is a possibility of creating intervention measures that healthcare units can approve to ensure that the nurses provide the best and quality healthcare services to the people. This paper presents a report on counseling and stress reduction strategies that have a positive influence on reducing the levels of burnouts of nurses in clinical settings.
References
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