Nurses' perceptions of the impact of health care reform and job satisfaction

Pyne, Donna G. (1998) Nurses' perceptions of the impact of health care reform and job satisfaction. Masters thesis, Memorial University of Newfoundland.

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Abstract

A descriptive correlational study was designed to investigate nurses' job satisfaction. The relationships among demographics, work-related variables, impact of health care reform, and job satisfaction were also examined. The Conceptual Model of Job Satisfaction, a modified version of the Mueller and Price (1990) integrated causal model, provided the framework for this study. -- The sample was comprised of 298 staff nurses employed in critical care, medical, and surgical areas of three acute care hospitals. The majority of subjects had diploma level education (81.1%) and were between 30 to 39 years of age (54.7%). A significant number were employed on a full-time permanent basis (72.4%), worked in surgical areas (42.8%), had 9 years or less of nursing experience (47.8%), and were in current positions for 5 to 9 years (43.1 %). Data were collected over a five week period. Instruments included the Impact of Health Care Reform Scale, the McCloskey/Mueller Satisfaction Scale, and the Descriptive Profile. -- Study findings indicated that nurses were slightly dissatisfied with their jobs, and were more negative than positive about the impact of health care reforms. Respondents were most satisfied with coworkers and interaction opportunities, and least satisfied with control/responsibility and extrinsic rewards. Respondents were most positive about professional issues, and most negative about quality of care concerns and workplace conditions. Workplace conditions, safety concerns, quality of care concerns, professional issues, and health care reforms depicted moderate to strong correlations with job satisfaction. Age, area of employment, nursing experience, and current position tenure were also found to affect levels of job satisfaction. During regression analysis four determinants (i.e., workplace conditions, safety concerns, quality of care concerns, and professional issues) and three correlates (i.e., age, area of employment, and current position tenure) combined to explain 48.8% of the variance in job satisfaction. -- The results of this study suggest that health care reforms are having a negative impact on job satisfaction. Although these results support some of the findings from previous research, there is certainly a need to conduct further research to examine the effects of other work environment factors on job satisfaction.

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