Mindfulness, emotional intelligence and occupational burnout in intensive care nurses: A mediating effect model

To construct structural equation models to test the mediating role of emotional intelligence in the relationship between mindfulness and occupational burnout.

Reports assessing the relationships among mindfulness, emotional intelligence and burnout, specifically in ICU nurses, are scarce.

This was a descriptive, correlational, cross-sectional research design with 883 ICU nurses enrolled by convenience sampling from 29 ICUs in seven tertiary hospitals in urban areas of Chengdu, China. Mediation analysis was performed by structural equation modelling. Indirect effects were evaluated through bootstrapping.

The associations among mindfulness, emotional intelligence, emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and personal accomplishment were all significant (p < .001). In the mediation models, emotional intelligence partially mediates the relationships between mindfulness and emotional exhaustion (indirect effect 0.118, p = .006; direct effect -0.374, p = .010; total effect -0.492, p = .011) and between mindfulness and depersonalization (indirect effect -0.182, p = .006; direct effect -0.452, p = .015; total effect -0.633, p = .018). Emotional intelligence plays a total mediating role between mindfulness and personal accomplishment (indirect effect 0.293, p = .004; direct effect 0.119, p = .053).

The results suggest that nursing manager could implement mindfulness training to improve occupational burnout in ICU nurses.

Nursing managers could help create a more favourable working environment by providing mindfulness training. Such mindfulness training could help improve nursing quality, reduce errors and ensure patient safety, possibly improving patient prognosis and probably satisfaction.