6 Ways to Fight Nursing Burnout

As a working parent, nobody has to tell you what work pressure and stress feels like. You may have practiced ways to balance your work and family life to make it through just fine. But what about if all your stress has evolved into something much bigger? It’s a phenomenon in the healthcare community, affecting nurses called nursing burnout.

Burnout is one of the six dimensions of distress, and has many negative implications on both professional and personal levels. Professionally, nursing burnout can hinder their job performance, change how nurses view their role, and it may have risks of putting patients in danger. Personally, the burnout affects their relationships, demeanor, and overall quality of life.

Everybody gets stressed out at some point in their life, but over a more extended period of their time, the burnout can become more serious – in other words, disengagement and exhaustion. Many nursing students and nurses can experience this negative feeling of nursing burnout because of their rigor and intensity of their program or work pressure. While nursing burnout may be a bad stepping stone for some, it doesn’t have to define a nursing career. Rotating shifts, long hours, and including the stress of caring for critically ill patients are just some of the factors that can lead to nurses burnout.

What Causes Nurse Burnout?

A significant part of healthcare is involved in maintaining multi-faceted; high-quality care is becoming commonplace with patients and their loved ones. Making time for handling emotionally taxing deep conversations with patients and their loved ones adds a physiological affliction to a nurse’s already chaotic shift. However, to keep patient care as their priority, nurses must invest in each patient’s well being. Patients need proper care, and regrettably, this type of thoughtful care can leave the nurse’s well-being at stake.

What Are Symptoms Of Nurse Burnout?

If left unchecked, burnout can negatively affect not only a nurse’s career and health but also patient outcomes. That is why it’s very crucial to be aware of the common warning signs of burnout and be proactive about preventing nurse burnout.

• Nurses are often tired. It’s inevitable when they work long 12-hour shifts and often go without proper break and sleep.
• Nursing is often a thankless job. So it’s normal to feel unappreciated most of the time. As a nurse, they may even dislike their job occasionally, especially after a stressful day or a traumatic event happened, like the death of a patient or so.
• Feelings of detachment and insensitivity are two common signs of burnout.
• Constant anxiety leads to nurse burnout. Sometimes this manifests itself when they can’t adapt to small changes in their work or life without feeling overwhelmed. 
• Nurse burnout can make them really sick. Common symptoms include heart palpitations, chronic pain, gastrointestinal issues, and a low immune system.

How Does Nurse Burnout Affect Patients?

Nurses suffering from severe burnout can adversely impact patient outcomes. Because of this, they may not follow through with care plans or testing procedures. Or, they can become distracted, which will prevent them from providing quality care to patients. Nurses burnout can affect patient outcomes in the following ways:

• Improper or unsafe care for patients
• Increased rates of infection or death rates in patients
• Slow reactions to urgent cases
• Pharmaceutical dosage errors or medical mistakes

The proper way to deal with nurse burnout is to prevent it. Nurses who begin to show these signs of burnout symptoms should seek help as soon as possible. This will help them to handle their condition before it worsens. Here are some ways nurses can avert burnout.

1. Identify Your Source of Stress

Try to identify the situations that are causing you to feel too overwhelmed. Once you have pinpointed what’s fueling your stress and feelings of job burnout, you can make a detailed plan to address and overcome the issues. If you have trouble to recognize what’s causing you to feel burned out, try tracking your work-life responsibilities for some days, and write down how you feel after you’ve completed each activity. Addressing and monitoring your feelings will help you to concentrate on your efforts on the areas that are defeating your passion for nursing.

2. Take Control of Work-Life Balance

Consider taking a vacation or reducing your workload as ways to prevent or recover from burnout. As a part of the plan, you may need to limit your interaction with people who will leave you feeling drained, and assign some tasks to other people, both at home and at work. Once you punch out from your job, disconnect from work at home and on your days off. Your priority should be – Don’t take your work home with you.

3. Consider Joining a Support Network

You might have friends, family members, or supportive colleagues you can talk to. But for some nurses, to heal their burnout issues, they may require assistance from a professional. Some hospitals and facilities offer an Employee Assistance Program to help their staff resolve their personal and work-related problems. Or you can consider attending a nursing conference to recharge and connect with fellow nurse colleagues. You can take advantage of whatever services are accessible to you.

4. Practice self-care

It’s very easy to get caught up in taking care of your patients and forgetting about your own needs. Nurses have to take care of themselves, including getting enough sleep, avoiding harmful substances, eating healthy foods, and staying physically active. A nurse may have a 12-hour shift, but most of them are working overtime, maybe on their feet all day at work, and their body needs to take rest at the end of a long day. Seeking spiritual health is the right choice. Whether it is yoga, prayer, or meditation, spend some time to calm your mind.

5. Find a Creative Outlet

When you are at the edge of your burnout, you’re more likely to make more mistakes, feeling unhappy, and losing your focus. Various researches suggest that creative endeavors can improve your overall mood, lower stress levels, boost your immune system, increase your energy, and provide a positive distraction from the things that are disturbing you. Maybe you’ve been thinking about taking golf lessons or trying an art class. Now is your time to bring some new hobbies into your life.

6. Consider Other Options

Have an honest talk about your burnout. If you’ve tried any other stress relief tips and tricks and see no improvement in your condition, it might be time to consider a job change. While it’s not an easy decision to make as some of you may choose this career as their passion, and you may find a less demanding job that supports your beliefs and values. If you want to work in the healthcare industry, consider changing your specialty. You will find so many other options from teaching to school nursing, to sales, to informatics. Before burnout affects you in a severe way, explore your career options, and find the right fit for you.