Intention to stay and nurses' satisfaction dimensions

Ashraf A Zaghloul¹, Mashael F Al-Hussaini², Nora K Al-Bassam²

¹Department of Health Administration and Behavioural Sciences, High Institute of Public Health, University of Alexandria, Alexandria, Egypt; ²Saad Specialist Hospital, Al-Khobar, Eastern Province, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Objective: The study was conducted to identify the satisfaction dimensions in relation to anticipated nurse turnover in an academic medical institution using an ordinal regression model.

Methodology: A cross-sectional descriptive study was designed to describe nurse job satisfaction in relation to their intention to stay at King Faisal University’s Hospital, Al-Khobar, Saudi Arabia. All nurses available at the time of the study were included (499 nurses in different departments). The response rate was 55.3% (276 questionnaires suitable for analysis). A self-administered questionnaire with 26 items was developed for this study with a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 = highly dissatisfied to 5 = highly satisfied).

Results: Nurses were least satisfied with the hospital’s benefits (1.2 ± 0.4), hospital policies (1.4 ± 0.5), bonuses (1.1 ± 0.3), fairness of the performance appraisal system (1.5 ± 0.5) paid time off (1.5 ± 0.5), and recognition of achievements (1.5 ± 0.5). The mean general job satisfaction score was 2.2 ± 0.4. Ordinal regression analysis revealed leadership styles and challenging opportunities as predictive dimensions for the intention to stay.

Conclusion: There are nurse job satisfaction dimensions other than salary and incentive that may be anticipated with the intention to stay in the health facility. Namely, leadership styles in the health organization and challenging opportunities at work.

Keywords: intention to stay, nurse satisfaction, ordinal regression