| A problem and a growing concern for healthcare executives is turnover of registered nurses in acute care organizations. Efforts to decrease turnover among registered nurses are becoming the area of focus. There is not one solution to promoting nurse retention because there is not one single cause or influencing factor. While there is not one theory that forms a single framework in promoting hospital nurse retention, numerous theories that connect literature on magnet hospitals, structural empowerment and organizational commitment to registered nurse intent to stay have been examined. This quantitative study was undertaken to examine the relationship among direct care registered nurses perception of empowerment structures based on the dimensions of opportunity, information, support, resources, formal and informal power; their disposition towards occupational commitment based on affective commitment, normative commitment, accumulated cost commitment and limited alternatives commitment; age, nursing education, years as a nurse, years in this hospital, nursing unit of work and intent to stay in this hospital. Additionally, this study determined which dimensions of structural empowerment, occupational commitment and involvement in decision making predicted the direct care registered nurses' intent to stay in this hospital. Overall, the study revealed that there were no significant differences by nursing unit of work on the empowerment structures, commitment dimensions, full- or part-time work status or education level; however, the empowerment dimensions of support, resources and opportunities were strong predictors of intent to stay, with support being the strongest predictor. Additionally, affective commitment was the strongest commitment dimension that predicted intent to stay. |
