Background. One of the most important psychosocial issues related to the nursing profession is moral distress (MD), which has devastating effects on student performance as well as patient care. The current study was conducted to determine the frequency, severity, rate, and causes of MD in nursing students. Methods. During this cross-sectional study, 86 samples were last year undergraduate nursing students of Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, who were entered into the study by the census method. Data gathering instruments were personal information form, Moral Distress Scale-revised (MDS-r), and Moral Distress Thermometer (MDT). Results. The mean frequency, severity, and rate of MD, according to the MDS-r questionnaire, were 1.3 ± 0.7 out of 4, 1.8 ± 0.8 out of 4, and 3.3 ± 2.3 out of 16, respectively. The average MDT score was 2.6 ± 2.5 out of 10. The most common causes of MD were working in unsafe conditions (6.8 ± 6.0), observing impaired patients health servicing (5.4 ± 5.6), and the low quality of patient care (5.1 ± 4.6). There was a statistically significant relationship between the gender, work experience, and participation in the professional ethics workshop variables and mean MDS-total and MDT. Conclusion. The rate and mean severity of MD were reported at a moderate level. Also, the MDT average was reported at a mild to an uncomfortable level, and the overall MD was equal to moderate. Therefore, student administrators should take steps to eliminate or reduce the causes of MD. In this regard, the need for teaching preventive methods against MD to nursing students before their clinical courses seems crucial. Also, students with MD must be referred to the psychiatric/psychologist.

Background. Nursing and midwifery students have relatively high levels of academic burnout. One of the mechanisms to combat this issue is resilience. The results related to the association between academic burnout and resilience indicate a negative association, but various studies have reported different correlation coefficients. Therefore, the current study was aimed to investigate the association between resilience and academic burnout among nursing and midwifery students. Methods. A total of 240 nursing and midwifery students were recruited in this cross-sectional study using stratified random sampling. Data were collected by a demographic information questionnaire, the Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC), and the Maslach Burnout Inventory-Student Survey (MBI-SS). Data were analyzed by SPSS-16 using t-test, ANOVA, Spearman’s correlation coefficient, and linear regression analysis. Results. The mean scores of academic burnout for nursing and midwifery students were 41.4 ± 14.8 and 41.2 ± 12.3, respectively, but the difference was not statistically significant ( p  = 0.368). The mean scores of resilience for nursing and midwifery students were 58.1 ± 13.3 and 52.9 ± 13.9, respectively, which showed a statistically significant difference ( p  = 0.004). Resilience was significantly inversely correlated with academic burnout in nursing and midwifery students (r = −0.04, p  < 0.001; r = −0.39, p  < 0.001). Increased resilience in students decreased academic burnout ( p  < 0.001). Conclusion. Academic burnout was moderate in nursing and midwifery students, but resilience was relatively high. Given the negative correlation between resilience and academic burnout, it is necessary to strengthen resilience skills and reduce factors that cause academic burnout.