Job Burnout of Nursing Administrators and Chief Executive Officers in University Hospitals and Its Relation to Their Demographic Features

Job burnout results from the reaction to the chronic psychological stress and it mainly occurs in care services. It may lead to consequences such as job cost, reduced performance and fatigue. This study aimed to investigate the nursing administrators and chief executive officers job burnout in three areas of depersonalization, fatigue and emotional exhaustion and its relation to some demographic features in university hospitals of Isfahan. In This cross- sectional study 198 nursing administrator's (metron, supervisor and head nurse) and chief executive officers were enrolled in the first semester in 2010. Data collected using modified native Maslach & Jackson's job burnout questionnaire. Its Cronbach’s alpha was 86%. Data analyzed by SPSS16 software using descriptive and inferential statistics such as Kruskal- Wallis, regression, and chi-square tests. 166 of the participants filled out the questionnaire. The participants were ranked from the highest rate of job burnout to the lowest in the following order: head nurses, supervisors, administrators who were a supervisor and a head nurse, metrons and chief executive officers. There was significant relationship between mean of job burnout and organizational status, sex and age in that head nurses had the highest mean and metrons had the lowest. However, there was no significant relationship between job burnout and marital status, educational level, the time and number of shifts, employment status and years of work in the current, position. There was significant relationship between emotional exhaustion and organizational status, so that head nurses had the highest and metrons had the lowest mean. There was no significant relationship between depersonalization and organizational status. Regarding the different levels of job burnout, it is necessary to adopt new policies for prevention of this phenomenon. The recognition of the problem, understanding the need to support, taking part in problem- solving activities considered as the most important factors in preventing the administrator's job burnout.