Salutary factors explaining why hospital nurses remain in work and the profession

Background: There is extensive research on how nurses experience their working conditions and environment; this research reveals high job stress, job dissatisfaction and intention to leave the workplace.Objective: The objective is to explore and describe factors explaining why hospital nurses remain in work and the profession.Methods: The salutogenic theory was used as a basis for the interview guide, which contained semi-structured, open-ended questions covering factors important to explaining why nurses remain in work and the profession. Data collection took place from March to June 2018. Individual interviews with 12 nurses working in a hospital in western Sweden were conducted. The data were analyzed using content analysis; additionally, sense of coherence (and its three dimensions: comprehensibility, manageability, and meaningfulness) was used as a tool to structure analyses of the qualitative data.Results: The following factors emerged from the analysis: having fun at work, being acknowledged, feeling togetherness in the team, having varying tasks with a manageable workload, good interaction between colleagues and patients, doing good work, feeling committed to and pride in the professional role, and having a balance between work and leisure time.Conclusions: One precondition of improving nurses’ health and well-being was having clear leadership. Another precondition was having a sense of coherence in relation to both the working group and the organization. Experiencing job satisfaction and being acknowledged for one’s good work were important; acknowledgement was received not only from patients, but also from colleagues, other professionals and the nurse manager. In this way, the nurses felt acknowledged and could create a sense of meaningfulness, manageability and comprehensibility in their work.