Job Satisfaction among Nurses in Teaching Hospitals Karapitiya and Mahamodara

Abstract

Background Nurses play an extremely important part of patient care. They also assume various roles such as patient educator, counsellor, health care facilitator and patient advocator. But most of the nurses remain as dissatisfied professionals in the world today. Nurses' job satisfaction directly affects the quality of patient care. There are intrinsic factors as well as extrinsic factors that affect job satisfaction. Method A cross sectional study was conducted using Grade 2A RNOs (Registered Nursing Officers) in teaching hospitals Karapitiya and Mahamodara. A purposive sample was selected including 50 nurses from Mahamodara and 300 nurses from Karapitiya. Data collection was done by a self administered questionnaire. Both close ended and open ended questions were used in the questionnaire and a scoring system was used to measure job satisfaction over intrinsic and extrinsic factors. Results From the sample of 350 only 227 nurses responded to the questionnaire including 205 female nurses (90.31%) and 22 male nurses (9.69%). According to the scoring system used the mean score related to extrinsic factors was 36.91 8.22 out of the total score of 65, the mean score related to intrinsic factors was 9.33  2.37 out of the total score of 19.The mean overall score was 46.24  9.55 out of the total score of 84.The nurses were placed under three groups (highly satisfied, averagely satisfied and poorly satisfied) with the overall score they have taken and it is found out that nearly 13% of the nurses are highly satisfied, 81 % are averagely satisfied and 6% are poorly satisfied. Nearly 83 % of the nurses are not satisfied with their wages, 67% on working overtime, 57% on supportive measures and 59% with the performance appraisal from their supervisors while 63% of the nurses are satisfied with the recognition they get as a nurse in public. There were no significant differences between the age and job satisfaction related to wage (x2=2.55, p=0.466>0.05) and to the age and performance appraisal from supervisors (x2=0.69, p=0.876>0.05). Conclusion The job satisfaction was average among the study population. As majority of the nurses are not satisfied with their wages, on working overtime, on supportive measures and on their performance appraisal it may lead to poor quality of patient care. Relevant authorities have a responsibility to enhance job satisfaction of nurses by a proper management plan.