Date of Conferral
2023
Degree
Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP)
School
Nursing
Advisor
Robert McWhirt
Abstract
Nurse leaders are a health care group that has been provided limited support to managestress and burnout symptoms, yet the impact of leader stress burden on staff satisfaction, patient outcomes, and their own health is vital to the provision of safe, high-quality health care. The problem of leader fatigue and burnout is the ability to retain current leaders and recruit the next generation. The purpose of this staff education project was to address leadership burnout due to stress and the lack of knowledge of how to manage stress in the moment. A combination of Watson’s theory of caring and Ray’s theory of bureaucratic caring provided the foundation for the project. The participant group included seven nurse leaders from four critical access hospitals in the central United States. The education provided was a PowerPoint presentation and small group discussion of applicable tools to manage stress and workloads. The tool to measure improvements in leader knowledge was an amalgamation of existing, validated stress-identification and job-related questionnaires. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. The overall stress score changed from an average of 51% to 19%. Another finding was the likelihood of nurse leaders continuing in their position or looking for promotion in leadership increased from 28% to 43%. The implications for positive social change are that a short education program supporting leader development can have significant impact on leader retention.
Recommended Citation
Hawkins, Rebecca Sue, "Managing Nurse Leader Stress to Promote Leader Retention" (2023). Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies. 14175.
https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/dissertations/14175
