Assault of staff in psychiatric hospitals is a frequent occurrence, and studies indicate that hospital staff are at risk of developing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We performed a correlational study with a convenience sample of 172 staff in a psychiatric hospital and compared the rate of traumatic events (TEs), resilience, confidence, and compassion fatigue to PTSD symptoms (PTSS). Regression analyses identified two variables that were unique predictors of PTSS: (1) trauma-informed care (TIC) meeting attendance and (2) burnout symptoms. Severe TEs, age, and compassion satisfaction also contributed to the model. Attention to these factors may help reduce PTSS in psychiatric staff.

Psychiatric nurses are subject to a high rate of assault by patients. The stress of exposure to assault and the potential for assault appear to impact nurses' emotional states in the form of post-traumatic stress and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Most studies report a prevalence rate of PTSD in this population of between 9-10%. Training in the management of aggressive patients, participating in Critical Incident Debriefing, and having routine structured debriefing meetings may play a role in facilitating the development of resilience in nurses with respect to the risk of PTSD. Knowledge about the state of the science regarding aggression and PTSD is necessary for clinicians and researchers to develop and test effective strategies. This article presents a review of the current literature on this topic.

Background Stressful environments can have significant effects on an individual and lead to burnout. Psychological consequences of burnout include trauma reactions, depression, anxiety and substance use disorders. Resilience, a protective mechanism can mitigate the negative impact of burnout. Method This study utilizes an exploratory correlational design to determine whether or not there is 1) a similar correlation between resilience and burnout between psychiatric nurses working in a high stress environment and students who are naive to the high stress academic environment and 2) a higher level of resilience in the psychiatric nurses compared to the healthcare students. Results A significant inverse relationship was observed with respect to resilience and burnout in both the professional nurse and student groups. However, the inpatient psychiatric nurse group was not found to have a higher level of resilience than the student group, when controlling for age. Conclusion: This suggests that resilience to burnout is not related to the work environment but life experience (age) was found to be a factor related resilience in this sample.

Background/purpose: Research from other disciplines demonstrates that ethical position, idealism, or relativism predicts ethical decision-making. Individuals from diverse cultures ascribe to various religious beliefs and studies have found that religiosity and culture affect ethical decision-making. Moreover, little literature exists regarding undergraduate nursing students’ ethical position; no studies have been conducted in the United States on students’ ethical position, their self-identified culture, and intrinsic religiosity despite an increase in the diversity of nursing students across the United States. Participants and Research Context Objectives: The study’s two aims were to determine the relationship of self-identified culture, religiosity, and ethics position of undergraduate nursing student and whether students’ level of education and past ethics courses taken related to idealism. Two hundred and twelve volunteer undergraduate students participated. Research design: A descriptive cross-sectional study was designed for participants who completed the Ethical Position Questionnaire, The intrinsic subscale of the Religious Orientation Scale, and a Demographic, Cultural, Ethnicity Form. To test the five hypotheses, analyses included t-tests, correlations, and ANOVA. Ethical Considerations: The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board at Adelphi University. Results: Idealism and intrinsic religiosity were significantly related. Differences were observed for intrinsic religiosity and idealism for cultural identity and cultural dimensions such as parents’ place of birth, and if participants were US born. Students’ level of education or participation in past courses on ethics did not influence idealism. Conclusions: The study’s findings were similar to most of the research from other disciplines on culture, ethics position, and religiosity. Generic courses on ethics taken prior to clinical work may not assist nursing students in integrating principles into complex ethical dilemmas. Self-identified culture, religion, and intrinsic religiosity related to ethics position; completing ethics courses and level of education, juniors compared with seniors, did not influence idealism. Faculty should consider integrating students’ culture, religious orientation, and ethics position into teaching ethics for all levels of nursing education.

This study attempted to evaluate the effect of a calorie-restricted diet on weight change in short-term acute care psychiatric patients receiving atypical antipsychotic medication. A descriptive correlational design utilizing chart review and a convenience sample of 100 participants was used. Fifty charts of patients hospitalized prior to the implementation of the calorie-restricted diet for those receiving atypical antipsychotic agents were compared to 50 charts of patients who received the diet. Weight changes in the two groups were compared relative to age, gender, length of time taking the medication, and the type of medication. The Mann-Whitney U test, Spearman's rank-correlation coefficient, and the two-way analysis of variance were used to conduct the analyses. The calorie-restricted diet was not significantly associated with a reduction in weight gain in participants who received any of the atypical antipsychotic agents except for olanzapine; therefore, findings indicate that the calorie-restricted diet may only be effective for patients receiving olanzapine.