Nurse Burnout Syndrome and Work Environment Impact Patient Safety Grade

Burnout impacts nurses' health as well as brain structures and functions including cognitive function, which could lead to work performance and patient safety issues. Yet, few organization-level factors related to patient safety have been identified.

This study examined nurse-reported patient safety grade and its relationship to both burnout and the nursing work environment.

A cross-sectional electronic survey was conducted among nurses (N = 928) in acute care Alabama hospitals.

In multilevel ordinal mixed-effects models with nurses nested within hospitals, all burnout dimensions of the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory (OR for +1 SD ranging 0.63-0.78; P < .05) and work environment (OR for +1 SD ranging 4.35-4.89; P < .001) were related to the outcome of patient safety grade after controlling for nurse characteristics.

Results indicate that health care organizations may reduce negative patient safety ratings by reducing nurse burnout and improving the work environment at the organization level.