Prevalence and Determinants of Stress among Staff Nurses Working in a Tertiary Care Hospital of Delhi

Abstract

Out of many groups who are affected by stress, nurses comprise an important group because of the unique environment in which they work. It is important to assess the status for their psychological well being for not only their own betterment but the betterment of their patients as well. The present cross sectional study was conducted among 200 nurses working in a tertiary hospital of Delhi to assess the prevalence of stress and different factors associated with it among them. The data were collected using “Professional Life Stress Scale” (PLSS) to measure stress and a self prepared questionnaire for getting socio demographic details and identifying the factors associated with stress. 55.7% respondents were found to be stressed of which majority (47.9%) had mild to moderate stress and 7.8% had severe to very severe stress. Excess duty hours (40.6%) were the main reason behind stress followed by emotional, financial, family & academic as other causes. Music followed by talking to friends was the main de-stressing method for them, carried out by 39.1 and 37.5% of the respondents, respectively. Meditation was done by only 22.4%. Only 15.1% were involved in some extra curricular activity like dance, sports and yoga. Perceived heavy work load, lack of job satisfaction, bad attitude of colleagues and seniors were some of the factors present significantly in stressed nurses group. More than half of the nurses in the study group were stressed which is a cause of concern and calls for urgent steps to start some initiative to take care of the mental health of this group.