Criterion
1 Project Idea
You have to
propose it on the discussion space
I have decided to work on the project
idea of “stress management and coping strategies among nurses in the healthcare
setting”. Nurses are the most highly
valued professionals in the society. But, I have seen a disturbing national
image of nurses in Australia due to escalating burnout and over-work. The
majority of nurses are of the view that their concerns are being ignored by the
management and they also have the fear of getting retributed if they speak out
(Khamisa, Oldenburg, Peltzer and Ilic, 2015). The national statistics reveal
that over 35% of the nurses are considering leaving this profession. This will
impact the healthcare system drastically as the healthcare workforce shortage
will be of 85,000 by the year 2025 and about 123,000 by the year 2030 (Holland and Tham, 2016). The
increasing stress among nurses is taking a heavy toll of patient care. This
outcome is occurring to multiple elements such as intense healthcare work
environment, lesser flexibility, unfriendly management, over work/burden,
excessive administration tasks, inadequate staff levels, and inadequate staff
skills mix (Lo, Chien, Hwang, Huang and Chiou, 2018). Therefore, it is the need
of the hour to make nurses feel stress free and confident and trained enough to
handle their workplace situations with effective coping strategies. Even my
several colleagues usually feel stressed on majority of their working days
(Opperman, 2016).
Criterion 2
To be asked to fellow
students on the group discussion board.
Can anybody help me to acknowledge
various risks and related risk management techniques in implementing stress
management strategies for nurses in the healthcare setting?
Criterion 3 Response to 3 other
Students
To be done in the
discussion Board and to be cut and pasted in Criterion 8.
Criterion 4 Justification of Project
Idea
To be done on the
discussion board
The project idea is clearly justified
because stress among nurses is an endemic issue globally which is contributing
to health problems in nurses and reducing their performance and efficiency. There
is a true need to provide the safety workplace environments with premium
quality healthcare services to patients from nursing professionals (Lo et al.
2018). To attain this goal, the most essential step in this ladder is to have
effective stress management and coping strategies for nurses (Opperman, 2016).
This project is aimed at identifying the key stressors among nurses and to
present the most effective strategies for stress management and coping from the
combination of literature search and nurse perspectives. The majority of Australian
hospitals have reported 30% of nurse turnover on yearly basis (Lo et al. 2018).
The acute nurse shortage has been identified in the mental health, aged care,
and palliative care health centres due to extreme physical and mental stress.
It is shocking to reveal that 37% of nurses reported being yelled at workplace
by their seniors; 41% nurses have experienced muscular stress; and 31% nurses
have experienced mental stress in the last 6 months of their profession
(Lenthall, Wakerman, Dollard, Dunn, Knight, Opie, Rickard and MacLeod, 2017).
With this project idea, the hospitals can be motivated to understand and focus
on the best strategies to help nurses manage and cope up with their support
through effective initiatives (Khamisa et al. 2015).
Criterion 5 Project Aim
The project aim is to identify the
key stressors among nurses and the most efficacious stress management and
coping strategies viable and reliable to be implemented in the healthcare
setting.
Criterion 6 Three SMART Project Objectives
1. To search and promote enhanced
understanding about the needs, problems, key workplace stressors, and required
solutions of the nurses within the healthcare settings within 7 days.
2. To identify and implement
the combination of individual coping strategies and institutional management
practices for effective nursing stress management within 1.5 months.
3. To enhance the quality of
healthcare services and performance by 30% with enhanced nursing support and
workplace satisfaction rate within 4 months.
Criterion 7 Justification & Rationale
for Project
This project is the sincere need of
the hour in the Australian healthcare industry because I am evident of the
increasing stress among nurses and their decision to leave this profession.
Even in my healthcare workplace, I have seen 6% reduction in nurse retention
process with significant reduction in patient outcomes and satisfaction rate
due to mentally and physically disturbed nurses (Khamisa et al. 2015). Every
healthcare setting wants to attain best quality of care and services for the
patients and this is impossible without satisfied and healthy nurses (Lenthall
et al. 2017). The lacking friendly environment, lacking management support,
more work and less time, and interpersonal conflicts are forcing this
profession to become a stressful option. Thus, the aims and ideas of this project
are highly supportive and justified (Lenthall et al. 2017). This project is
high on its scope of retaining as much nurses as possible with key focus on
helping them to manage their stress and enhance their abilities at the same
time (Lo et al. 2018). This defined project will be setting a positive example
for every healthcare setting to primarily focus on keeping nurses stress free
and supportive in all circumstances to attain the healthcare goals. It is
because stress-free nurses will be able to present stress-free healthcare
services and better patient outcomes (Opperman, 2016).
It
has been universally accepted that the human nature is highly prone to wide
range of wears and tears linked with daily activities. This is actually manifested
in the form of strains and stress in the daily life. The nurses are highly exposed
to several types and levels of stress and burnout in the daily professional
life with increasing job demands (Opperman, 2016).
As per Lenthall et al. (2017), the nursing professionals are extremely exposed to extreme stressors
of inadequate staffing, intense administrative workload, lack of effective communication
flow, lack of support, and mental traumas due to patient death and medication
errors. The nurses have high-level responsibilities (Holland and Tham, 2016). The nurses also need to be
supportive and emotionally stable for the dying patients and their families
which increase their physical and mental stress. They even have to face
unavoidable and sudden extended working hours, huge manual work, and difference
social vices such as verbal and physical abuse from patients, family members,
and senior colleagues (Lo et al. 2018). Several nurses have come up with their experience of
severe scrutiny due to their action impactions and reactions to the senior
management. This makes their professional course unbearable and they either
decide to leave the job or get mentally affected. Thus, stress management and
coping strategies are highly important for nurses (Lenthall et al. 2017).
This
project is a necessity to make nurses feel important, comfortable, and
contended in their profession and to assure their positive productivity. With
this project outcome, the nurses in all healthcare settings will get
opportunities to enhance their capabilities and get encouraged to provide
positive care and contribution to the healthcare industry (Khamisa et al. 2015). When there will adequate nurse
staffing, better inclusion in healthcare decisions, better support from
management, and strategic development, they will surely feel associated and
will develop a relaxed mind-set. The project is required to improve the
disturbing healthcare coordination and relationships (Lo et al. 2018). With a supportive healthcare
environment, stress will automatically take a backseat. This project will help
in inculcating positivity and a happy overall nursing balance to enhance the
quality of life for all healthcare stakeholders (Holland and Tham, 2016).
No
one can deny the fact that stress basically consists of relationships between
individuals and their surrounding environment which are taken as challenging
aspects or being exceeded from their resources and jeopardizing the health (Opperman, 2016). The human nature of responding to
stress is either psychological or physiological. Stress is surely a worldwide
epidemic as it is associated with 90% of patient visits as reported by World
Health Organization (Lo et al. 2018). This project is directly focused on the ways to reduce among nurses.
Again, this project is justified because it will make the nurses feel important
and believe in themselves.
Criterion 8 Three interactions
Three interactions with three students on discussion board
are required.
Holland,
Peter. and Tham, Tse Lang. 2016. Burnt-out and overworked, Australia’s
nurses and midwives consider leaving profession. The conversation. Available
at- https://theconversation.com/burnt-out-and-overworked-australias-nurses-and-midwives-consider-leaving-profession-66141
Khamisa, N., Oldenburg, B., Peltzer,
K. and Ilic, D., 2015. Work related stress, burnout, job satisfaction and
general health of nurses. International journal of environmental
research and public health, 12(1), pp.652-666.
Lenthall, S., Wakerman, J., Dollard,
M.F., Dunn, S., Knight, S., Opie, T., Rickard, G. and MacLeod, M., 2017.
Reducing occupational stress among registered nurses in very remote Australia:
A participatory action research approach. Collegian.
Lo, W.Y., Chien, L.Y., Hwang, F.M.,
Huang, N. and Chiou, S.T., 2018. From job stress to intention to leave among
hospital nurses: A structural equation modelling approach. Journal of
advanced nursing, 74(3), pp.677-688.
Opperman, C.S., 2016. Facilitating
Positive Professional Practice Environments.