Life satisfaction, job satisfaction, life orientation and occupational burnout among nurses and midwives in medical institutions in Poland: a cross-sectional study

OBJECTIVES: To assess life satisfaction, job satisfaction, life orientation and the level of professional burnout in a group of professionally active nurses and midwives. DESIGN: A cross-sectional study. SETTING: This study was conducted between March and October of 2017 during specialisation training at the European Centre for Postgraduate Education in Wroclaw, Poland. PARTICIPANTS: A group of 350 professionally active nurses (n=293) and midwives (n=57) were enrolled in the study. OUTCOME MEASURES: Associations between burnout and selected life-related and job-related outcomes using (1) the Satisfaction With Job Scale, (2) the Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS), (3) the Life Orientation Test-Revised, (4) the Maslach Burnout Inventory and the Authors’ Designed Questionnaire regarding sociodemographic factors. The level of statistical significance was set at p≤0.05 (with a CI of 95%). RESULTS: The vast majority of participants were those in the ages of 41–50 years old (40.57%), women (96.86%) and people with bachelor’s degree (46.29%). The average overall rate for occupational burnout was 34.67 per 100 points. Assessment of occupational burnout subscale showed that the most significant factor was emotional exhaustion at 39.14 points (SD=28.15). Job satisfaction, life satisfaction and life orientation assessed with SWLS significantly affects each of the occupational burnout subscales (p<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The level of occupational burnout in nurses and midwives appeared to be low. It has been revealed that such determinants as life satisfaction, job satisfaction and life orientation do not allow for developing an occupational burnout.