Burnout and the work environment of nurses in psychiatric long-stay care settings

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between burnout and a number of work-related factors among nurses working in psychiatric long-stay care settings. Another aim was to investigate the differences between these associations at individual and at group level. Differences were found in the correlations, as well as in the regression analyses, at individual and group level. The correlations between burnout and the independent variables were more often significant at individual level and the explained variances of the regression analyses were much higher at ward than at individual level. Results showed that work environments associated with low levels of burnout were those in which workers had good support and feedback, job clarity, autonomy and low levels of complexity in their work, who had managers with a social leadership style and who had realistic expectations about their patients' potential for rehabilitation. Furthermore, it was found that it was not the individual work experience of the nurse that was important in determining burnout, but the mean work experience of the nursing staff.