Burnout syndrome among Mexican hospital nursery staff

To identify frequency and related factors to burnout syndrome in the nursing staff at a specialty hospital in the Mexican state of Guanajuato.

A prolective, analytical cross-sectional study was carried out. In 236 randomly selected nurses, a 35-item questionnaire proposed by Cyberia Shink was applied in a blind survey. Seniority, workplace, shift and kind of service, work category, age and marital status were investigated for a link with burnout syndrome.

Mean age of nursing personnel was 33+/-11.93 years with 13+/-7.2 years of seniority; 95 (40%) workers showed emotional exhaustion, 78 (32%) felt dehumanized, 148 (63%) had lost interest in their work, and 120 (50%) reported general exhaustion. From the studied nursing personnel, 92 (39%) showed burnout syndrome-compatible data. There were statistical differences with nurses without burnout syndrome age >33 years (p=0.001), seniority (p=0.05), and workplace (p=0.05), but not with kind of medical service (p=0.36), shift (p=0.86), and work category (p=0.96). Questionnaire validity in agreement with alpha Cronbach test was 0.7496. Relation between professional attrition and work environment was r=0.738.

The instrument can be relied upon to identify burnout syndrome and is considered as acceptable. Age, seniority, and workplace are factors linked to nursing staff with burnout syndrome-compatible data. Employers, managers, and supervisors of health care services must promote preventive actions for burnout syndrome to synchronize present work conditions in nursing staff with their biologic characteristics.