Lived Experiences of Being a Nurse Having Occupational Hazards in a Hospital Setting

Chonpimai, Geneva

Saturday, 29 October 2011

Geneva Chonpimai, MS
Nursing service department, King Chulalongkorn Memorial Hospital, Bangkok, Thailand
Areewan Oumtanee, RN, PhD
Faculty of Nursing, Chulalongkorn University, Pathumwan, Bangkok, Thailand

Learning Objective 1: to understand experience of nurses who have work harzards

Learning Objective 2: to learn which occupational harzards nurses may have while working in a nursing unit

The purpose of this research was to describe lived experiences of being a nurse having occupational hazards in a hospital setting. Hermeneutic phenomenology of Martin Heidegger was applied as research methodology. Data were collected by using in-depth interviews of 14 professional nurses who experienced occupational hazards in a Tertiary hospital. Data analysis followed Diekelman’s content analysis was used in this study.

Occupational hazards as experienced of professional nurses consisted of 4 major themes as follows:

1. Having accidents from work, nurses get hurting including 4 sub-themes: 1.1) exposing discharge or sharpen tools, 1.2) getting harm by client(s), 1.3) being hurt from electric shock, and 1.4) getting hit hard by an emergency-cart.

2. Having illness as a result of work including 6 sub-themes: 2.1) getting infectious disease with long period of treatments, 2.2) being busy with timeless for food and rest room, 2.3) having back and shoulder pain, and tendonitis, 2.4) having thigh ache due to long hours of walking and standing 2.5) being stressful from work and colleagues and 2.6) getting severe migraine because of inadequate rest.

The study findings provided for more understandings on occupational hazard of professional nurses. Nurse managers can use them as guideline for risks management planning for work safety.

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