News Release

An investigation of nurses' job satisfaction in a private hospital and its correlates

Job satisfaction and its impact on staff performance, absenteeism, retention, and turnovers in health care services has been a topic of global interest over decades

Peer-Reviewed Publication

Bentham Science Publishers

"An investigation of nurses' job satisfaction in a private hospital and its correlates" by Wai Tong Chien and Sin Yin Yick (The Open Nursing Journal, 10, 99-112. Doi: 10.2174/1874434601610010099)

Job satisfaction and its impact on staff performance, absenteeism, retention, and turnovers in health care services has been a topic of global interest over decades. Particularly, job satisfaction and stress are two facets highlighted by nurses, for which their job satisfaction is negatively correlated to stress and intention to leave employment in hospitals or other clinical services. There are a wide variety of factors influencing job satisfaction such as heavy workload, low collegial or peer support, poor organizational climate, lack of job autonomy, and dissatisfaction with salary pay. Nevertheless, Hong Kong, and other Asian countries, have not been at the forefront of research on nurses' job satisfaction and related factors, particularly in private hospital settings. It is interesting and important to study on this topicexpecially when considering the unique culture, practices and environment of Asian hospital settings. We hope the results can provide further evidence for the policymakers to re-establish a satisfactory environment for nurses, and even other clinicians.

In 2014, a cross-sectional, descriptive correlational study was conducted with 139 nurses (21%) working in a 400-bed private hospital in Hong Kong. The majority of them were registered and enrolled nurses (87%) and worked in acute and outpatient care settings (95%). These nurses reported moderate levels of job stress and intention to quit. Their job satisfaction was negatively correlated with job stress and intention to quit; whereas, the nurses' job stress was positively correlated with their intention to quit. Nurses who were older in age and had more post-registration experience and/or working experience in private hospitals showed higher job satisfaction, particularly with respect to salary and workplace autonomy. To reduce the cost of recruiting and training new staff in the healthcare system, we encourage hospital managers and administrators to develop strategic measures to enhance job satisfaction, better collegial relationships intra- and inter-disciplines, and to reduce job stress and by extension, the intention of nurses to quit.

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