Study On The Correlation Between Time Management Disposition And Job Burnout Among Nurses In Three Shenzhen Municipal Hospitals

BackgroundPreventing job burnout is a hot topic in nursing management and nursing psychology. Some literatures indicate that nurses’ job burnout and turnover intention are closely related to overload work pressure. The studies on the correlation between job stressors and burnout among nurses show that the pressure is caused by workload and time allocation, work environment and resources, management and relationship, etc. Among these factors, the workload and time allocation make a larger influence.As the development of new modes of nursing care, nurses today bear increasing tasks than before. The fast-paced works and growing job requirements not only require nurses to have professional nursing care skills, but also good time management capacity. How to manage time effectively and improve work efficiency becomes an important issue. According to some studies, some nurses can allocate time well, finish their work orderly and handle the relationship between work, study and families properly. It is illustrated that they suffer from lower pressure. However, some nurses, who feel difficult to due with work and life efficiently, always complain about their high pressure. According to some researches, time management has certain correlation with work pressure that improving the ability of time management can reduce the occupational stress. In addition, work pressure has correlation with burnout that reduce occupational stress would lead to the decrease of burnout level. Therefore, it can deduce that time management has correlation with job burnout. As the personality of time management behavior, time management disposition plays a role of predictor for burnout.There are many domestic and overseas researches about job burnout which divide the influence factors of burnout into three major categories, professional characteristics factors, organization and social factors, as well as personality factors. A number of literatures have studied the correlation between personality and burnout. But few researches are about time management disposition. As can be found from the present literature, most of the studied objects are enterprise staffs, teachers, and civil servants, while few nurses have been discussed.Limited by research scales, the previous domestic studies focus on teenagers. However, as the study is developed in depth, more adults are paid attention recently. As a result, the objects are gradually extended to enterprise staffs, teachers and other occupational groups. Nurses, a special group of occupation, are also increasingly studied on the topic of time management disposition in recent years.There are many domestic and overseas researches about the correlation between burnout and other personality factors, and the correlation between time management and work. But few researches are about time management disposition, especially for nurses.Therefore, this study is aimed to study the current situation of time management disposition and job burnout of nurses in Shenzhen municipal hospitals, and study the differences between demographic variables information, and discuss the correlation between research objects, and analysis the role that time management disposition plays in the formation and development of burnout by using questionnaire as the major survey method. The primary objective of this research is to use time management disposition as a quality test, and improve nurses’ ability of time management and explore methods to reduce incidence of burnout caused by high working pressure and provide theoretical to improve the standard of nurses’ mental health.MethodsThis research adopts general situation questionnaires, Chinese version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory-Human Service Survey (MBI-HSS) translated by Feng Ying and the nurses’ Time Management Disposition Scale (TMD) revised by Ying Ju-su as survey tools. The general research contents of the questionnaire include6-item: gender, age, working experience, education background, job title, department. MBI-HSS is a22-item survey that includes three dimensions of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and diminished personal accomplishment. The MBI-HSS items are rated on a7-point scale, which represent the different frequency of a appearing feeling from0to6levels. The higher level of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, and the lower level of personal accomplishment, represents the more serious degree of burnout. The44-item TMD includes nine dimensions and three subscales, namely sense of time value, sense of time control, and sense of time efficacy. The items are rated on a5-point Likert scale.1point is completely disapproved, while5point is completely approved. The higher level shows the higher degree of time management disposition.Using multistage sampling method, this research randomly chooses nurses from three Shenzhen municipal hospitals as survey participants. In total,239of the270questionnaires are returned,225of which are valid. It means the effective rate is83.33%. In addition, Excel2010system is used to input and analyze data, while the SPSS16.0are used for statistical analyzing, including descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, nonparametric tests, correlate, regression, etc.Results1. The comparison of burnout of nurses in Shenzhen municipal hospitals by different demographic variables is as follow. Regarding the nurses’ burnout in Shenzhen, there are not significant differences in diverse groups divided by gender, age, seniority, education background and job title (P>0.05), but in different departments (P<0.05). The levels of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization of nurses from emergency department (ED) are29.17±9.65and12.24±6.80, higher than the level of the nurses from other departments (P<0.05). The level of personal accomplishment is23.53±7.94, lower than that of nurses from other departments (P<0.05).2. The situation of job burnout among nurses in Shenzhen municipal hospitals is as follow: Emotional exhaustion is23.59±10.64, with the detection rate of38.7%. Personal accomplishment is28.34±9.66, with the detection rate of33.3%. Depersonalization is that M=7.00, QR=9.00, with the detection rate of48.0%. There are159nurses be found that suffering job burnout, with detection rates of70.7%. There are74nurses are at a low degree, with detection rates of32.9%,59nurses are at middle degree, with detection rates of26.2%,26nurses are at serious degree, with detection rates of11.6%.3. The comparison of TMD of nurses in Shenzhen municipal hospitals by different demographic variables is as follow. In terms of the nurses’ TMD in Shenzhen, there are not significant differences among diverse groups of genders, education backgrounds and job titles (P>0.05). In different groups of ages, the level of sense of time control in the group≤25ages is82.35±11.11, higher than that of other groups, considered extremely significantly (P<0.05). The other dimensions have no significant differences (P>0.05). In different seniority, the level of sense of time value in the group of11～19years is39.21±5.68, higher than other groups, considered extremely significantly (P<0.05). The other dimensions have no significant differences (P>0.05). Regarding the sense of time control, there are significant differences among different departments. That of ICU and ED is the lowest, with the levels of72.68±9.93and74.43±11.27. Setting goals, plans and feedback are considered extremely significantly (P<0.05), the levels of ICU and ED are lower than the other departments. The levels of ICU are14.17±3.10,13.33±2.92,13.67±3.19. The levels of ED are14.76±3.19,14.19±3.09,14.05±3.20.4. The situation of TMD among nurses in Shenzhen municipal hospitals is as follow: The total level of TMD is149.46±20.94, the sense of time value is37.10±6.44, the sense of time control is78.05±11.75, the sense of time efficacy is34.32±5.47.5. The relationship between TMD and burnout of nurses in Shenzhen municipal hospitals is as follow. Sense of time value has a significant positive correlation with personal accomplishment (P<0.05). Sense of time control and time efficacy have a significant negative correlation with the emotional exhaustion and depersonalization (P<0.05), and have a significant positive correlation with personal accomplishment (P<0.05). And the three dimensions of TMD has a significant positive correlation with personal accomplishment (P<0.05). The sense of time control has negative effect on the emotional exhaustion and depersonalization. Sense of time efficacy has positive effect on the personal accomplishment. Conclusion1. The detection rate of job burnout among the Shenzhen nurses is at a mild level. The detection rate of depersonalization is the highest, while emotional exhaustion is second and personal accomplishment is the lowest. In this survey, there are differences between diverse departments. The burnout of emergency department is more serious than that of other departments.2. Time management disposition of the nurses in Shenzhen is at the medium level. The level of sense of time value is the highest, while sense of time control is second and sense of time efficacy is the lowest. There are differences between diverse departments. Setting goals, plans and feedback are considered extremely significantly. The level of ICU and ED is the lowest.3. There is a negative correlation between TMD and job burnout. Sense of time value has positive correlation with personal accomplishment. Sense of time control and time efficacy has a negative correlation with the emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, and a positive correlation with personal accomplishment. The sense of time control has negative effect on the emotional exhaustion and depersonalization. Sense of time efficacy has positive effect on the personal accomplishment.