Factors affecting nurse turnover in public hospitals in Male’, Maldives: a phenomenological study to understand why nurses resign

Abstract

Nurses leaving their jobs or leaving the profession, commonly known as turnover, is a significant issue of concern universally (Dewanto & Wardhani, 2018). Nationwide, the average registered nurse turnover rate is estimated to be 15% to 36% per year (Halter et al., 2017). Shortages of nurse’s due to high turnover lead to burnout and job dissatisfaction among nurses, decreases in staff morale, a decline in consideration for patients, increased errors and patient dissatisfaction related to new inexperienced staff (Gess et al., 2017). Therefore, it is significant for health care organizations to identify the main causes of turnover and promote effective interventions to reduce nurse turnover (Yamaguchia et al., 2016).

The purpose of this qualitative, phenomenological study is to explore the experiences of nurses in order to identify the main factors that contributed to leaving their job in public hospitals in Male’. An advantage of identifying these contributing factors is that it could help healthcare organizations to implement successful strategies and workplace solutions in order to improve nurse retention, which will also save organizations costs on nurse recruitment, motivate present employees enhancing their job satisfaction and improve the standard of care given to patients in in public hospitals in Male’. Chapter 1 of this research study will consist of a brief background of the topic along with relevance and justification, problem statement and conceptual definitions of some of the main terms used in the study.