Correlation between nurse's occupational stress and professional communications between nurses and physicians

The nursing staff, compared to other professions, have less healthy work environment and always face a lot of job stress. The quality of the relationship between nurses and physicians has a significant impact on nurses. Thus, the aim of the present study was to determine the correlation between job stress for nurses with professional communication between nurses and physicians. All nurses working in three hospitals of Bonan and Maragheh in 20111 with a minimum of one year clinical experience were invited to participate in the study. Finally, data were collected from 90 nurses. In this descriptive – correlation study, data were collected using Physician-nurse collaboration questionnaire and occupational stress questionnaire. Data analysis was performed using SPSS software and descriptive statistics (proportion, percentage, frequency, mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (Pearson correlation test). The mean age of the nurses was 32.5 ± 7.80 years and the mean duration of their clinical work was 8.83 ± 7.74 years. Furthermore, Pearson correlation test showed that there was a significant correlation between job stress for nurses with their views on their professional relationships with physicians (correlation coefficient 0.22 and significant level 0.02). From the perspective of nurses, their professional communications with physicians were moderate. So it seems that planning to improve the quality of the relationship between doctors and nurses can lead to reduction in occupational stress.