Moral distress among staff nurses in RAS AL khaimah hospitals, united arab emirates

Abstract

Nurses suffer from moderate to high levels of moral distress in different clinical settings that affect nurses' quality of care and the organization's reputation. Moral distress causes nurses' dissatisfaction, burnout and eventually change or quit their position. The aim of this study is to describe the moral distress intensity, frequency, association with demographic variables and specialty of care. The impact of moral distress on the staff nurses is also described. A descriptive study is used to achieve the objectives of this study. Twenty one (21) items of the Moral Distress Scale-Revised (MDS-R) were used to measure moral distress intensity and frequency. The mean moral distress score was 77.43, SD 45.58 (0-336). Staff nurses from the coronary care unit and intensive care unit had significantly higher and lower moral distress respectively (f = 3.47, p = 0.004) and no significant relation was found among sociodemographic variables such as sex, nationality, marital status etc., except for age, which had a significant relationship with moral distress (f = 3.17, p = 0.017). Approximately one third (33.98%) of the staff nurses wanted to leave their current position because of moral distress. Strategies to overcome moral distress of staff nurses and future research at other setting and larger sample size are recommended.