| Description |
Purpose: There is a nursing shortage worldwide, which is partially due to nurses leaving the workforce prematurely. This phenomenon has been particularly prevalent within emergency, critical care, and oncology. This burnout has been linked to a concept termed "compassion fatigue", where nurses' ability to show needed compassion or empathy toward a patient is compromised due to stress. Compassion fatigue affects both nurse retention rates and patient outcomes. Preliminary research suggests that resilience programs mitigate these problems. There is a noticeable lack of research on how nurse resilience classes affect nurse outcomes in nurse residency programs. Methods: For this thesis, a resiliency curriculum was designed for the nurse residency program at the Huntsman Cancer Hospital, called the Huntsman Oncology Nurse Residency (HONR). This resiliency thread fits in with the coursework required with HONR and is disseminated in a meeting with residents monthly. This resiliency curriculum consists of twelve modules, each with different components of resiliency, spread over a year period. For this Honors thesis, the design and content for the modules will be presented with a learner evaluation of the content. The effects of the resiliency program on levels of nurses' compassion fatigue and resilience will also be evaluated, in the hopes of its feasibility in other nurse residency programs. Results: Twelve nurse residents participated in the HONR resiliency training. Participants completed the HONR Professional Quality of Life (ProQOL) survey at baseline, a six-month timepoint, and a twelve-month timepoint. A learner feedback survey was given to the nurse residents after the year-long resiliency training was completed. Six HONR ProQOL participants completed the surveys at baseline and the 3 six-month time point. Seven HONR ProQOL participants completed the surveys at baseline and the twelve-month time point. Six participants responded to the learner feedback survey qualified for analysis. Compassion satisfaction and Burnout scores both significantly improved from baseline to the six-month timepoint. Burnout scores also improved from baseline to the twelve-month timepoint. According to the learner feedback survey, all resiliency modules were at least somewhat helpful. Conclusion: This small pilot study highlights the promise of resiliency programs in mitigating the effects of burnout and compassion fatigue in nurse residents. The results suggest that the design of the HONR resiliency thread was efficacious in decreasing burnout in nurse residents at six-months and twelve-months, as well as increasing compassion satisfaction at six-months. Further research is needed to test the effectiveness of this intervention in a larger sample and among different specialties of nurse residents. |
