Research on the nursing turnover rate and the reasons of turnover among hospital nurses

Background: Nursing has always been a profession that has had a high turnover rate. Therefore, under this circumstances the quality, the quantity and the cost of patient care has been influenced. For this reason, turnover rates and the reasons of this condition is the point that the managers must seriously focus on and produce effective strategies to solve this important health care problem.Aim: The aims of this research performed in order to provide data to clarify the measures that authorities may take to reduce the turnover rate among nurses and planning of nusing workforce are the followings;1)The determination of the voluntary turnover rate in private and university hospitals in 2005 and 2006, 2) The investigation of the reasons of nursing turnover.Methods: In this descriptive research, 11 university hospitals and two private hospitals were included to assess the turnover rate; 150 nurses were included to determination of the reasons of nurse turnover. The nurses who left their jobs were come into contact by using snowball method. So as to assess socio-demographic characteristics and turnover reasons of the nurses, a questionnaire was used. The data was obtained from a couple of ways such as face to face interview, phone-call, and e-mail. The data was evaluated by using SPSS 11.0 computer program.Findings: The resrearch results has proved the diversity between permanent staff and contractual staff; the nursing turnover rate for the permanent staff in university hospitals in 2005 is %0.51- %7.25; for contractual staff the rate is %1.52-%15.82; in 2006 for the permanent staff, turnover rate is %0.34-%5.59; for the contractual staff, the rate is %1.51-%33.34. On the other hand the nursing turnover rate in private hospitals is %20.96-%26.96 from 2005 to 2006. It has been determined that the negative condititions of the work environment, the excessive workload, the unsatisfaction from the management, and inefficient salary are the most common reasons of nursing turnover.Result: This research has shown that,when compared with the permanent staff, the nursing turnover rate especially among the contractual nurses is rather high and the work environment is an important cause of leaving job for them. Therefore, it has been suggessted that the increase in salaries, the improvement of the work environment, and the more supportive management can be the solution to reduce the turnover rate.Key words: Nursing, turnover rate, reasons of turnover, regular nurse, contract nurse.