Doctors and Nurses: A Systematic Review of the Risk and Protective Factors in Workplace Violence and Burnout.

Jose Miguel Giménez Lozano,Francisco Manuel Morales Rodríguez,Juan Pedro Martínez Ramón

doi:10.3390/ijerph18063280

Jose Miguel Giménez Lozano, Francisco Manuel Morales Rodríguez + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18063280

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Abstract

The present study aims analyze the risk factors that lead to high levels of burnout among nurses and physicians and the protective factors that prevent them. Thus, it is also intended to explore the possible correlation between physical and verbal violence produced at work and the symptoms derived from burnout. Methods: The search was carried out on the Scopus, PubMed and Web of Science databases between 2000 and 2019 (on which date the bibliographic search ends). Descriptive studies estimating the prevalence of workplace violence and risk and protective factors and burnout were included. An adapted version of the Downs and Black quality checklist was used for article selection. 89.6 percent of the studies analysed were in the health sector. There is a significant correlation between burnout symptoms and physical violence at work. On the one hand, the risk factors that moderate this correlation were of structural/organisational type (social support, quality of the working environment, authoritarian leadership, little autonomy or long working days, etc.) and personal type (age, gender, nationality or academic degree, etc.). On the other hand, protective factors were the quality of the working environment, mutual support networks or coping strategies. The results were analysed in-depth and intervention strategies were proposed.

Highlights

Workplace violence (WV) is understood as any type of act, incident, or behavior in which a person is abused, threatened, humiliated, or assaulted in the workplace, including verbal and physical assaults [1]
Most of the research related to burnout and WV is focused on the nursing profession, with 71.64% (N = 16,473) representing the nurses who have been evaluated
Regarding risk and protective factors, it should be clarified that any action contrary to a risk factor, or that goes in the opposite direction, is understood as a protective factor

Summary

Introduction

Workplace violence (WV) is understood as any type of act, incident, or behavior in which a person is abused, threatened, humiliated, or assaulted in the workplace, including verbal and physical assaults [1]. The many studies related to WV have observed that the risks of exposure to this type of situation are very high in those jobs that imply providing a service to people, so the nursing and medical profession would stand out for the nature of one’s own work as a facilitator for the creation of WV situations [2]. Previous models related to working conditions and the work environment assumed that workplace violence was based exclusively on situations involving physical violence, leaving aside stress, overwork, or the psychological demands of the task itself [4]. Mucci [5] observed that working conditions such as high work demands, job control, type of leadership, peer support, company organization, and even gender (higher among women than among men) correlated with WV.

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