Stress Management among Nurses : Literature Review of Causes and Coping Strategies

Abstract

The nursing profession has been known as a stressful profession that influences the quality of health care delivery and patient safety. In nursing, occupational stress such as workload and organizational factors including leadership are the major factors of causing stress among nurses. Therefore, it is important to enhance the workforce quality of nurses. Effective stress management and coping strategies are essential steps to produce nurses’ work achievement and to reduce/control the level of stress among nurses. The aim of this study was to reveal the causes of stress among nurses and coping strategies that could be used in controlling and managing stressful events to build the awareness and the knowledge among nurses and nursing students about the stress, its causes, and the way to reduce or cope with it once it occurs. The literature review has been used for this study. Transactional Model of stress and coping by (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984) was the used theory for this study. Inductive qualitative content analysis has been chosen as a method for analyzing the data. Findings of this study recommended that managers and supervisors should develop strategies to address and promote the quality of working conditions for nurses profession.