Strategies for reducing hospital nurse turnover in South Korea: Nurses' perceptions and suggestions

Abstract

Aim To explore the South Korean nurses' perspectives on the current hospital working conditions in order to identify causes of persistent high turnover rates among the nurses. Background High turnover rates of hospital nurses continue to pose a serious challenge to South Korean health care system despite the government's recent efforts to improve working conditions. Many studies in the past had examined factors related to the turnover and provided only a partial understanding of turnover predictors. However, nurses' perceptions on the current working conditions must be considered to explore possible causes of continued high turnover, to identify solutions and to improve working conditions by addressing nurses' concerns. Method This study is a qualitative study using focus group interviews with 33 nurses from 11 South Korean hospitals. Results Three main themes and eight subthemes related to reducing hospital nurse turnover were identified. Conclusions To address hospitals' nursing shortages in South Korea, it is important to address poor work environments. Implication for Nursing Management This study showed that more transformational policies should be developed and implemented to change working conditions by reducing excessive workloads and improve how nurses are treated and viewed so as to retain existing nurses and ease the nurse turnover rates.

Nurse turnover: A longitudinal survival analysis of the Korea Nurses' Health Study

“…In other words, there is a negative attitude towards pregnant nurses, and nurse managers often disregard the difficulties of pregnancy and focus on the loss of the nursing workforce (Lee et al, 2021). This lack of understanding and inflexible culture may influence nurses to leave their profession or organization (Yun & Yu, 2021). In this regard, decreasing the influence of pregnancy on nurse turnover in South Korea might be a difficult issue without changing policies to alter management systems in healthcare institutes.…”

Nurses’ turnover intention, hope and career identity: the mediating role of job satisfaction

“…Though recruiting more nurses may help, retaining nurses in hospitals is another and potentially more effective method to cope with the problem of nursing shortages. Therefore, how to tackle the problem of nursing turnover has received increased worldwide attention [ 11 , 12 ].…”

Emotional Labor, Burnout, Medical Error, and Turnover Intention among South Korean Nursing Staff in a University Hospital Setting

“…Since the mental health of healthcare professionals, including nurses, can relate not only to well-being at the individual level but also to patient safety outcomes (i.e., through medical errors and the like), there is a need to focus on the mental health of this population [ 2 ]. In addition, unfavorable mental health conditions among nurses can relate to high turnover intention; in fact, South Korean nurses are being constantly challenged with high turnover rates, and there is a need to improve what are poor working environments [ 3 ]. Additionally, although costs vary depending on the environment, nurse turnover costs pose a major concern for healthcare organizations [ 4 ].…”