[Strategies for nurses to cope with the stress caused by working with mental patients]

This paper comprises a quantitative research to evaluate the coping mechanism in order to face stress in the nurse's work with the bearer of mental illness. It was conducted in seven psychiatric hospitals in the city of Fortaleza, Ceará, Brazil. The following instruments were used: socio-demographic data to describe the sample, an inventory in order to identify individual coping features. The sample comprised 42 participants, most of them female, corresponding to 92.9% of the total. Conclusion can be drawn that in order to deal with these stressing situations, the majority of the nurses used strategies focused on the problem, solving it when it arose or trying to review the situation with the possibility of an engaging attitude.