Are Pediatric Critical Personnel Satisfied With Their Lives? Prediction of Satisfaction With Life From Burnout, Posttraumatic Stress, and Posttraumatic Growth, and Comparison With Noncritical Pediatric Staff

Abstract

Objectives: Staff in PICUs shows high burnout, posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, and posttraumatic growth levels. However, their levels of satisfaction with life and how positive and negative posttrauma outcomes relate to each other and contribute to predict satisfaction with life remain unknown. Thus, we attempted to explore these aspects and to compare the findings with data from pediatric professionals working in noncritical units. Design: This is an observational multicentric, cross-sectional study. Setting: The PICU of nine hospitals in Spain, and other pediatric units in the same hospitals. Subjects: Two hundred ninety-eight PICU workers (57 physicians, 177 nurses, and 64 nursing assistants) and 189 professionals working in noncritical pediatric units (53 physicians, 104 nurses, and 32 nursing assistants). Intervention: Participants completed the Maslach Burnout Inventory, the Trauma Screening Questionnaire, the Posttraumatic Growth Inventory, and the Satisfaction With Life Scale. Measurements and Main Results: Of PICU staff, 16.4% were very satisfied with their lives, 34.2% were satisfied, 34.6% showed average satisfaction with life, and 14.8% were below average. No differences were found between PICU and non-PICU workers. Women reported lower satisfaction with life than men, and physicians reported higher satisfaction with life than other professional groups. The correlation between posttraumatic stress disorder and posttraumatic growth was low, but significant and positive. According to the path analysis with latent variables, 20% of the variance satisfaction with life could be predicted from burnout, posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, and posttraumatic growth. Higher distress was inversely associated to satisfaction with life, whereas posttraumatic growth contributed to higher satisfaction with life. Conclusions: Posttraumatic growth can moderate the negative effect of traumatic work-related experiences in satisfaction with life. PICU and non-PICU workers were equally satisfied with their lives. Positive and negative impact of work-related potentially traumatic events can coexist in the same person. Interventions aimed at reducing distress and fostering posttraumatic growth could impact in an improvement in pediatric health professionals’ satisfaction with life.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Intensive Care Unit Nurses: A Concept Analysis

“…Both Salmon and Morehead’s (2019) study and Vahedian-Azimi et al’s (2019) study reported that ICU nurses with PTSD can experience diminished concentration and cognitive ability, which has been linked to medication errors (Park & Kim, 2013). Hyperarousal symptoms, such as feeling irritable or having angry outbursts, were endorsed by those ICU nurses with high scores measuring PTSD in Rodríguez-Rey et al’s (2019) study.…”

“…In addition, nurses may exhibit a lack of empathy toward their patients, sometimes termed compassion fatigue (Salmon & Morehead, 2019). Many ICU nurses with PTSD experience symptoms of burnout caused by excessive stress in the demanding work environment (Colville et al, 2017; Mealer et al, 2009; Rodríguez-Rey et al, 2019). Burnout arises from the inability to cope with work-related stress over an extended period of time and is characterized by emotional exhaustion, depersonalization (cynical or indifferent attitude toward one’s job), and decreased sense of personal accomplishment (Maslach et al, 1986; Vahedian-Azimi et al, 2019).…”

Post-traumatic growth and influencing factors among frontline nurses fighting against COVID-19

“…Exploring these changes may help them reflect on their experience and find meaning in it, which may mitigate the negative effect of traumatic work-related experiences and improve their satisfaction with life. 14 The PTG model proposed by Tedeschi and Calhoun 15 suggests that rumination is an important cognitive process that leads to individual growth through traumatic events or negative changes. However, previous studies have mainly focused on the negative emotions of frontline nurses.…”

Health-Related Quality of Life and Emotional Distress Among Mothers of Sons With Muscular Dystrophy as Compared to Sex- and Age Group–Matched Controls

“…However, participating mothers also had relatively high levels of education and income, which matched the control group well. Furthermore, many of the members of the control group work in a high-stress hospital environment, which is prone to burnout, 42 making the identified differences between mothers and controls all the more striking. If compared to women from the general population, differences in health-related quality of life and emotional distress may have been even larger.…”