Relationship Between Work Engagement, Psychosocial Risks, and Mental Health Among Spanish Nurses: A Cross-Sectional Study

Abstract

Background: Exposure to risk factors may lead to health problems of varied nature and to an increased risk of suffering accidents at work.Objectives: The aim of this study was to evaluate the work engagement, psychosocial risks, and psychological well-being of Spanish nurses, analyzing existing relationships, and their associations with self-reported mental health problems of nurses.Methods: To this end, a cross-sectional observational study was carried out with a sample of 1,704 Spanish nurses between January 2019 and January 2020, using a self-administered questionnaire containing sociodemographic variables, the Spanish version of the Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire (CoPsoQ-istas21), the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9), and the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12).Results: The Kruskal-Wallis test showed that nurses' perceptions for each of the tests significantly differed among different healthcare areas (p < 0.05). The results indicated that emergency nurses offered higher scores in all dimensions of the CoPsoQ-istas21 and GHQ-12 tests; and in primary care, nurses scored higher in all three dimensions of the UWES-9 test. In addition, self-perceived health and vigor at work were identified as predictive factors of mental health.Conclusions: A high percentage of Spanish nurses perceived a high level of psychosocial risk in the exercise of their duties and nearly 41% could suffer from some mental health-related problem. Primary Care nurses showed higher levels of work engagement and lower perception of psychosocial risks than Emergency nurses. Results may allow to identify a professional profile which is more likely to suffer from psychological distress, as both the working conditions and the work commitment expressed by nurses in their daily work are key elements in assessing the possible psychosocial risks to which they may be exposed.

Impact of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation on Work Engagement: A Cross-Sectional Study of Nurses Working in Long-Term Care Facilities

“…However, many studies on nurses from other countries have reported mean engagement scores above 4 out of 6 in all three dimensions [58][59][60]. For example, a study from 185,835 Spanish nurses reported a mean engagement score of 4.59 [61]. Nevertheless, the work engagement scores tended to have positive correlations with nurses' age in the current study, which is consistent with findings from other studies [62][63][64].…”

“…Nurses working in LTC facilities had relatively poor work engagement levels. The mean work engagement score of nurses in LTC facilities was compared with data from previous studies to elucidate the characteristics of the study sample [57][58][59][60][61]. The mean work engagement scores in this survey were 2.98, and nurses working in LTC facilities appeared to be less engaged in their work than other occupations in Japan.…”

Psychometric Properties of the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES-9) in a Sample of Active Health Care Professionals in Spain

“…25 Mitonga-Monga and Hlongwane explained this relationship by arguing that workers with a high sense of coherence achieve their work objectives by perceiving the world as predictable, organized, and orderly. 50 A worse state of mental health, as occurs during psychological distress, is associated with a lower WE, as was observed in the study by García-Iglesias et al 51 with Spanish nurses and in papers such as Gorter and Freeman 52 and Holmberg et al 53 with health workers.…”

Occupational Well-Being of Multidisciplinary PHC Teams: Barriers/Facilitators and Negotiations to Improve Working Conditions

“…However, their “unreal” absence does not indicate well-being at work. The literature shows that commitment and job satisfaction increase the positive bonds of health professionals with the work environment to the extent that job involvement increases when professionals learn to decrease occupational risks, which contributes to greater job involvement and pleasant working hours [ 51 , 52 , 53 , 54 , 55 ].…”