Burnout
Nursing is perceived to be a high-risk profession since nurses are always putting their lives on the front line to handle emergencies. Therefore, nurses are more vulnerable to mental problems and psychological stress, which leads to burnout. Burnout refers to a state of life-threatening exhaustion due to long term stress. Stress in this profession could be due to; personal reasons or issues at the workplace. Burnouts result from a lack of support and working in an environment with fewer nurses than the patient number (Hetzel-Riggin, 2020). When nurses experience burnout, it leads to decreased nursing quality. This paper summarizes findings in the article, nursing shortage in Poland and other countries in the face of employee aging.
Scholars have argued that most American nurses working in hospitals and nursing homes have experienced a high level of job dissatisfaction and burnout due to stress. The number of aging people in the world is likely to rise from about 901 million to 1.4 billion by 2030. With a rise in the population of the elderly, the community is expected to get chronic illness. Therefore the need for their care will increase. Increased needs call for an increased number of staff in the work place. If the nurses do not work in rotation, it might result in some members working for longer shifts; they end up getting tired.
Moreover, the nursing shortage is an issue of national concern in japan. Japan pays its nurses low salaries that amount to 740 USD. Additionally, japan does not accept the immigrant workforce in their health sector because they think that immigrants might threaten Japan’s economy. Besides, immigrants could lead to crime. More nurses are required in such a scenario where a quarter of the 126 million are older people. However, due to low salaries and understaffing, many nurses might experience burn out.
Poland experiences a high number of nursing shortages due to low expenditure on the health sector. A study by the Organization for Economic Co‐operation and Development (OECD) showed that 6.4% of Poland’s GDP was given to the health sector (Marć, 2019). This amount of money is not sufficient enough to cater for all factors in the health sector. That means nurses will get little salaries, and hence there will be low motivation to work. Besides, the nurses end up getting stressed because they have bills to pay, yet their salary is insufficient.
Research has proven that salary cuts have resulted in unsatisfied nurses in Poland. Many nurses are migrating to other countries in seek of greener pastures. The Central Register of Nurses in Poland has shown that foreigners are less likely to apply for nursing positions due to low pay.
In conclusion, with almost all countries such as; USA, Australia, South Africa, Poland, and Japan experiencing nursing shortage; at a time when the population is aging and many chronic diseases are kicking in; every country is trying to improve on the pay of nurses, and giving better working environment to prevent the mortality rates.
References
Hetzel-Riggin, M. D., Swords, B. A., Tuang, H. L., Deck, J. M., & Spurgeon, N. S. (2020). Work Engagement and Resiliency Impact the Relationship Between Nursing Stress and Burnout. Psychological Reports, 123(5), 1835–1853. https://doi.org/10.1177/0033294119876076
Marć, M., Bartosiewicz, A., Burzyńska, J., Chmiel, Z., & Januszewicz, P. (2019). A nursing shortage–a prospect of global and local policies. International nursing review, 66(1), 9-16.doi.org/10.1111/inr.12473