Nurses' professional commitment in COVID-19 crisis: A qualitative study

Background: Professional commitment is an important factor in employee performance. COVID-19 outbreak has seriously affected the nurses working conditions. Numerous factors can affect nurses' professional commitment in this situation.Aim: To explore the nurses' lived experiences, attitudes, views and perceptions toward professional commitment and factors affecting it in the Covid-19 crisis.Method, Setting and Participants: This qualitative study was conducted using phenomenological approach and content analysis method. Twenty-five nurses were interviewed using semi structured in-depth interviews. Conventional content analysis was used to analyze collected data.Ethical considerations: Ethical approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee of Qazvin University of Medical Sciences.Results: Five themes were extracted as follows: "Collaborative empathetic commitment", "Loyal commitment", "Sacrificial commitment", "Commitment with doubt and concern" and "humanistic commitment".Discussion and Conclusion: The Covid-19 crisis has caused major changes in nurses' working conditions, which have also affected the concept of professional commitment to the nursing profession and revealed new concepts. Identifying internal and external factors that can enhance nurses' commitment to the profession in critical situations such as the Covid-19 outback is of particular importance.