Work Environment and Workload as Correlates of Intent to Leave Among Nurses

Abstract

The healthcare system is facing challenges it has never seen before: more complex patients and fewer workers. This study examined the relationships among nurses' work environment, workload, and intention to leave.  Using a descriptive-correlational approach, 419 nurses from government hospitals in the northern Philippines were surveyed using the Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index (PES-NWI), the NASA Task Load Index (NASA-TLX), and a three-item intent-to-leave scale. Pearson's correlation coefficient was used to analyze the relationships between the different variables. There was a significant negative correlation (r = .252) between nurses' intention to leave and the overall work environment.  The strongest correlation (r =- .261) was found between turnover intentions and staffing and resource adequacy. Recently, a statistically insignificant direct correlation was found between high perceived workload and the intention to leave (r =- .074), suggesting a more complex relationship than is generally believed. The findings suggest that better work environments tend to make nurses stay. Furthermore, workplace factors, specifically staffing and resource levels, play a significant role in nurse retention. The non-significant result for workload implies that its influence may be indirectly mediated by factors such as burnout. This study is significant because it identifies specific, achievable areas that hospital administration could focus on to improve retention.  Future research should examine the mediating factors of workload and expand the study to different healthcare settings to validate these findings.