Investigating the effect of nurses' satisfaction with the physical environment on their job stress and quality of work life in medical environments (Case study: Female nurses working in healthcare centers in Urmia)

Research Problem:

 Today, in architecture, medical centers are not considered places with just a given function but also are seen as spaces with healing architecture. In addition to having a therapeutic function for patients, these spaces can positively influence staff working in them, especially female nurses as a sensitive group who are constantly present in such therapeutic environments. On the other hand, since the environment influences behavior, the physical components of healthcare environments seem to affect nurses' job stress and quality of work life, which is aimed to be analyzed in the present study.

Research Question: 

According to the abovementioned, the present study seeks to answer the following questions, how are female nurses' quality of work life and job stress in the hospitals of Urmia city? What is the relationship between female nurses' satisfaction with the physical environment of the hospital and their quality of work life and job stress in the studied population? Does female nurses' quality of work life influence their job stress in the studied population?

According to the abovementioned, the present study aims to investigate how the female nurses' quality of work life and job stress, how female nurses' satisfaction with the physical environment of the hospital influences their quality of work life and job stress, and how female nurses' quality of work life influence their job stress in the studied population.To achieve the abovementioned objectives, the main research hypotheses are as follows:1. There is a positive and significant relationship between each factor of the conceptual research model and its indicators.2. Female nurses' satisfaction with the physical environment of the hospital has a positive and significant effect on their quality of work life in these environments.3. Female nurses' satisfaction with the physical environment of the hospital has a positive and significant effect on their job stress in these environments.4. Female nurses' quality of work life has a positive and significant effect on their job stress in medical environments.

The present study is descriptive-correlational survey research in which the data were quantitatively analyzed to extract required information carried out using SPSS 24 and LISREL 8.8 software. The data were collected using library, documentary, and field studies. The statistical population included female nurses who worked in the healthcare centers of Urmia in 2017. In the present research, a researcher-made questionnaire was developed and its reliability and validity were examined and confirmed. Then, it was distributed among 220 female nurses who were selected from the studied population using the random sampling technique.

The results confirm the presented conceptual model. Also, the results indicate that satisfaction with the physical environment of medical centers is positively and significantly correlated with the quality of work life (path coefficient=0.76) and job stress (path coefficient=0.63) in the studied population, implying the effective role of architecture in reducing female nurses' job stress in the therapeutic environment and as a result, increasing their quality of work life.