Resilience and work-related stress among mental health nurses in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Work-related stress is harmful physical and emotional reactions that can occur when there is a conflict between an employee’s work needs and his or her level of control to meet those demands. Work-related stress can come from multiple causes, however, when stress occurs in unmanageable amounts for the nurse, mental and physical changes may occur. Resilience gives people the mental toughness to deal with stress, trauma, adversity, and difficulties. The study aimed to explore the level of work-related stress among mental health care nurses and their resilience capacity at Eradah & Mental Health Complex–Eradah Services (EMHC-ES) in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. A descriptive, correlational, cross-sectional research design was utilized taking the responses of 172 nurses. The questionnaire encompassed the Mental Health Professional Stress Scale (MHPSS) 42 items assessed on a four-point Likert scale and the Connor Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC-10) 10-items assessed on a 5-point Likert scale. The results revealed a satisfactorily high level of resilience (M = 30.7 on a scale of 0-40) and a moderate level of stress among the participants (M = 1.86 on a scale of 0 to 3) with the mean subscale score was the highest for the workload associated stress and the lowest for the homework conflict-related stress. There was a near to significant correlation between the stress level and the resilience among the participants (p = .053). An appropriate strategy in health care organizations to assess stress, explore causes, and provide early management in mental health care settings is highly recommended.