Abstract:
This study developed and used a novel approach to measure population health impacts, combining both mortality and morbidity burden, among nursing staff at a tertiary hospital to support organization design and management. Since nurse professional is a major workforce for health care systems in most countries, they face several challenges including shortages, high turnover, and inequitable distribution. As a result of heavy workload many nursing staff suffer from health problems and burnout resulting in low productivity at work. We collected data on diseases and illness conditions of target population using self-reported questionnaire and electronic medical records. Disability weights and estimated duration of disease were derived from Thai Burden of Diseases study and relevant international resources. Job weights were estimated using point rating method, in comparison with the organizations salary scale. Information from self-report questionnaire was found to better represent target population than information from medical record. The analysis applied similar methods to calculate disability adjusted life year (DALY) with organizational perspective. Years Working with Disability (YWD) and Years of Work Lost (YWL) were calculated for nursing population subgroups e.g. by disease and disease category, age groups, and hospital ward. Total disease burden among nursing staff in the year 2014 was at 48.3 years of full work productivity. The YWD accounts for 48.2% of total disease burden. The top three leading causes of disease burden are ovarian cancer (45.8%), anxiety disorders (14.6%) and osteoarthritis (13.9%). Mental disorders including anxiety are the highest non-fatal cause of disease burden which occurred mostly in younger and inpatient nurses. Cancer was the only fatal disease which incurred the largest disease burden of 25 years or 51.8% of total disease burden. The rankings of diseases by their DAWY by ward and age group were slightly affected by the use of job weights. This study shows that non-communicable diseases constitute the major disease burden in the nursing staff. More attention to psychological conditions of nursing staff is required especially among young staff and those working in high workload ward. Our findings can be used by hospital managers and nurse supervisors to improve their work conditions and to select appropriate health promotion interventions.