Quality of nursing work life and turnover intention among nurses of tertiary care hospitals in Riyadh: a cross-sectional survey

BACKGROUND: Nurse turnover has a negative impact on the ability to meet patient needs and provide a high quality of care, which may create more stress on other staff due to increased workloads. This can lead to critical changes in the behavior of nurses towards their jobs resulting in low work satisfaction, low productivity, and leaving the organization. Thus, this study aimed to assess the quality of nursing work life (QNWL), to explore the nurses’ turnover intention and to examine the correlation between QNWL and nurses’ turnover intention. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was conducted on nurses with at least 1 year of nursing experience at two hospitals selected randomly from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: King Fahad Medical City and King Faisal Specialized Hospitals. Data were collected using a self-administered questionnaire comprising four sections (Brooks’ survey of QNWL, Anticipated Turnover Scale (ATS), open-ended questions and demographic characteristics). RESULTS: A sample of 364 nurses was recruited. Results proposed that the participants were dissatisfied with their work life (54.7%), with almost 94% indicating a turnover intention from their current hospital. Moreover, 154 (93.3%) out of 165 nurses who reported satisfaction with QNWL indicated the intention to turnover. The correlation between QNWL and ATS for binary variables was too week (r = − 0.024) and statistically not significant (p = 0.206). CONCLUSION: The QNWL and nurse turnover are challenging issues for healthcare organizations because of its consequences and impact on patient care. Our study provided critical findings low indication satisfaction of nurses with their QNWL and a high turnover intention. The results of this study could be used as a nexus for the development of regulations and practical strategies to enhance QNWL and to decrease the turnover.