Mediating effects of nursing organizational climate on the relationships between empathy and burnout among clinical nurses

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

To investigate how nurses who worked in Guangdong province in China perceived empathy, nursing organization climate and burnout.

DESIGN

A cross-sectional quantitative research design was used. We carried out the research in accordance with the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational studies in Epidemiology checklist.

METHODS

The study was carried out from August-October of 2018 using a structured electronic questionnaire. A total of 965 participants were selected with convenience sampling in Guangdong province.

RESULTS

A total of 786 valid questionnaires were collected in this study. The average burnout score of participants was 38.19 (SD 13.32) and 67.4% of them rated their burnout as more than 30 points, while 5.7% were higher than 60 points. The multi-variable linear regression model explained 9.4% of the variance in burnout related to sociodemographic variables (p < 0.001). Empathy was significantly and positively associated with nursing organizational climate and emotional exhaustion while negatively associated with reduced personal accomplishment. In addition, nursing organizational climate mediated the relationship between empathy and reduced personal accomplishment.

CONCLUSION

Our findings suggest that both empathy and nursing organizational climate are protective factors that prevent burnout in this population. Managers can alleviate nurses' burnout through developing empathy and improving the organizational climate.

IMPACT

This study demonstrates that empathy is not the cause of burnout; rather, it can prevent nurses from experiencing burnout. Nursing organizational climate is another protective factor that has a mediating effect on empathy and burnout. Improving empathy and nursing organizational climate could help reduce nurse burnout.

Role of self-efficacy in nursing organizational climate: A way to develop nurses' humanistic practice ability

AIM

This study aimed to investigate the impact of self-efficacy on the relationship between organizational climate and humanistic practice ability (HPA) in Chinese nurses.

BACKGROUND

To date, studies on the effect of organizational climate on nursing care have focused on care outcomes rather than care processes. Thus, this effect remains poorly understood.

METHODS

A total of 757 participants were sampled from three tertiary hospitals in Guangdong Province from November to December 2019; subsequently, they completed a structured electronic questionnaire. A structural equation model was used to explore the impact of nursing organizational climate on nurses' HPA.

RESULTS

A total of 688 valid questionnaires were collected. The nurses' average HPA score was 107.82 (SD 12.47). There was a positive correlation between organizational climate and HPA (r = .409, p < .05). Additionally, self-efficacy mediated this relationship (p < .01).

CONCLUSIONS

This study provides new insights into nursing organizational climate, self-efficacy and nurses' HPA.

IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING MANAGEMENT

The significant mediating effect of self-efficacy suggests that managers should implement nurse professional development programmes using targeted strategies to foster greater self-efficacy, which could improve the quality of care and nurse-patient relationships.

Portuguese Version of the 12-Item Violence Prevention Climate Scale: Test of Psychometric Properties

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

A violence prevention climate is critical for nurses' well-being but also for nursing practice and the quality of care. This study examined the reliability and factor validity of the European Portuguese version of the 12-item Violence Prevention Climate Scale (VPCS).

METHODS

Data came from a sample of 120 nurses providing care in Portugal. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the structural theory of the scale.

RESULTS

First and second-order confirmatory factor analysis models showed identical goodness-of-fit suggesting the adequacy of the models to the sample data. Our results also provide evidence of composite reliability, and convergent and discriminant validity.

CONCLUSIONS

Consistent with previous studies, data from this study showed that the Portuguese version of the 12-item VPCS is a reliable and valid scale to evaluate nurses' perceptions of a violence prevention climate.