Introduction and Background
Understanding the motivation of healthcare workers is a critical element of improving management practices, which will contribute to increased work satisfaction, reduced burnout, and help minimize nurse turnover rates. All of the four elements are crucial for ensuring that hospitals in the Qassim region operate efficiently. Hence, this research aims to examine a tool appropriate for evaluating nurse satisfaction rates and applying it to nurses working in the Qassim region.
The main focus of this study is nurses’ motivation since, in any healthcare entity, nurses are the main element of operations, allowing hospitals to function and help patients. According to Bodur and Infal (2015), motivation is often linked to both performance rates and desire to quit a job, which makes this domain important for healthcare managers. These factors are the central elements of a hospital’s quality of care. Nagaradeh, Dehghan-Nayeri, and Ghasemi (2015) state that nursing staff shortages affect healthcare facilities around the world, presenting a severe challenge to hospital managers. The main factor that is linked to this shortage is increasing work dissatisfaction, which motivates nurses to work in other occupations.
If hospitals are understaffed, and they do not have enough nursing personnel, the patients do not receive proper care, and the current trends suggest that nurses are dissatisfied with their work conditions. Nagaradeh, Dehghan-Nayeri, and Ghasemi (2015) cite a study that was carried out in some states in Europe, where burnout rates of nursing personnel were assessed, and the outcomes suggest that from 10% to 78% of nurses are burdened by their job.
Besides, depending on the country, from 14% to 49% of nurses who participated in this study reported that they had an intention to leave their occupation. These numbers are high, suggesting that the current policies and managerial practices used by hospital managers have to focus on the factors that motivate nurses to work to ensure that there is a sufficient number of nursing personnel.
Aim and objectives
The rationale for choosing the topic is the need to enhance work conditions and work satisfaction of nurses in Qassim hospitals. The objectives of this paper are to examine the factors that have major impact on nurses’ motivation using questionnaires. The prespecified hypothesis is the idea that the motivation of nurses ‘motivation can be affected by proper management. Additionally, it is hypothesized that nursing burnout and satisfaction with work is associated with their motivation.
The knowledge gap between what is currently known about nurse motivation and the study itself is the understanding of nurse motivation in Qassim, and how it affects the work of these nurses, Current research contains many studies that focus on nurse motivation and employe varied methods, however, a specific study that would target the Qassim region does not exist, leaving a significant gap for understanding the best practices applicable in this specific cultural and social environment.
Nurses have to display care for their patients as well as professionalism and knowledge of medicine in order to work efficiently. Existing theories of motivation suggest that there are two primary sources of it – intrinsic, relating to internal factors, and extrinsic, which refers to external sources of motivation. However, the specific factors can vary, depending on the country, background, work conditions, and other elements.
Study significance
There are several definitions and models of motivation that aim to describe the complex nature of this concept. If addressed correctly, motivation can have a positive effect on work performance. However, it is unclear what specific factors prompt people to become nurses and work in this domain of medicine. Studies, such as the one by Nagaradeh, Dehghan-Nayeri, and Ghasemi (2015), suggest that extrinsic motivation, for example work compensation, does not have a notable impact on nurses’ performance and their job satisfaction. Hence, this study will help improve the comprehension of the factors that motivate nurses in the Qassim region to work.
As stated Nagaradeh, Dehghan-Nayeri, and Ghasemi (2015) the quality of services is the main issue of healthcare and the understanding of elements that will motivate nurses to display better care for their patients is essential, since understanding the specifics “enables nurse managers to inspire nurses for continuous quality improvement” (p. 436). Hence, this study will contribute to the quality improvement of hospital care.
In total, four entities in the domain of healthcare will benefit from this research.. Firstly, the nurses themselves will be more content with their jobs, and the hospital managers will be able to enhance the quality of care and rates of satisfaction among their personnel. Also, the patients in Qassim will benefit from the quality of care since the enhancement of motivation should have a beneficial impact on the nurses in a healthcare facility, their willingness to work, and burnout. Finally, other researchers will be able to use the findings to advance the knowledge of nurse motivation further, will also benefit from the findings. Therefore, although there are studies that focus on nurses’ motivation for work and the factors, which have an impact on it, this research aims to address the gap of understanding the specifics of motivation for nurses working in Qassim.
Instrument
The instrument that studies, which provide background for understanding the issue of motivation in nursing use, are questionnaires. Questionnaires allow for a qualitative assessment of factors and elements that contribute to increased motivation for work or towards its decrease. Questionnaires are an excellent method in descriptive studies that can help understand the specific motivation factors. The variable of interest for the study by Bodur & Infal (2015) was motivation, and internal factors, which were collected through the authors’ questionnaire, and the correlation between different elements were examined.
The variable of interest for Hassankhani, Agdham, Rahmani, and Mohammadpoorfard (2015) are self-efficacy and motivation, and the information was collected through questionnaires and evaluated using Cronbach’s test. For the study by Nagaradeh, Dehghan-Nayeri, and Ghasemi (2015), the variable of interest is motivation levels in comparison to work-related factors, which were assessed through questionnaires. Toode, Routasalo, Helminen, and Suominen (2015) use motivation and scales for intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, and the authors compared the factors to determine the most critical elements. Kantek, Yildirim, and Kavla ( 2015) examine motivation in relation to work conditions, such as experience and appreciation.
In four out of five cases, the authors used the descriptive study as the primary assessment method. Toode et al. (2015) applied a cross-sectional study, which helped the authors measure the motivation of nurses at a specific point in time. These methods are comparable since the author authors also applied methods that allowed them to assess nurses’ answers at a specific time, without comparing the results over several periods.
Related Studies that used the instrument
Table 1 summarizes the five studies that examine the nurses’ motivation using the questionnaire as the main instrument for data collection.
Table 1. Summary of studies that used the questionnaire instrument (created by the author).
References
Bodur, S., & Infal, S. (2015). Nurses’ working motivation sources and related factors: A questionnaire survey. International Journal of Human Sciences, 12(1), 70-79.
Hassankhani, H., Agdham, A. M., Rahmani, A., & Mohammadpoorfard, Z. (2015). The relationship between learning motivation and self-efficacy among nursing students. Research and Development in Medical Education, 4(1), 97-101. Web.
Kantek, F., Yildirim, N., Kavla, İ. ( 2015). Nurses’ perceptions of motivational factors: a case study in a Turkish university hospital. Journal of Nursing Management 23, 674– 681.
Negarandeh, R., Dehghan-Nayeri, N., & Ghasemi, E. (2015). Motivating factors among Iranian nurses. Iranian Journal of Nursing and Midwifery Research, 20(4), 436–441. Web.
Toode, K., Routasalo, P., Helminen, M., & Suominen, T. (2014). Hospital nurses’ work motivation. Scandinavian Journal of Caring Sciences, 29(2), 248–257. Web.