Job-related Stress among Nurses in Selected Hospitals of Pokhara, Nepal

Abstract

Introduction: Nursing is considered as one of the most stressful and demanding profession. In the health care organizations, work stress may contribute to absenteeism and turnover, both of which detract from the quality of care. The aim of this study was to assess the job-related stress and to identify and compare the factors associated with job stress among nurses’ working in selected hospitals of Pokhara, Nepal.

Methods: The descriptive research design based on simple random sampling method was used. The sample size was 238. The data was collected using self-administered questionnaire consisted of socio-demographic information and Expanded Nursing Stress Scale. Both descriptive and inferential statistics was used for data analysis.

Results: The study findings showed that majority of nurses were in moderate level of stress and ‘patients and their families' were the most stressful factors perceived by both government and private hospital nurses. ‘Problems with peers’ was the least stressful factor perceived by both group of nurses and experiencing ‘discrimination’ was also the least stressful factors for private hospital nurses. Furthermore, a chi-square test revealed significant association between work setting and job stress in government hospital nurses.

Conclusions: Nurses working in the both government and private hospitals were working under stressful conditions.