Investigation of the relationship between nurses' ability to ethical values and quality of work life

Improving the quality of work life for nurses, who play a crucial role in the healthcare system, is essential to guaranteeing the effectiveness and quality of patient care, maintaining the nurses' commitment to the organization where they work, and expecting the best performance from them. In addition to making moral decisions for both themselves and the individuals they care for, nurses are expected to be able to handle ethical dilemmas that come up in the course of their work. The manner nurses work, how long they work, and the department they work in all contribute to their overall work-life quality, which in turn influences their capacity to resolve ethical dilemmas. This research was conducted to examine the relationship between nurses' predisposition to ethical values and their quality of work life. The population of the research, which was conducted in a descriptive and correlational type, included nurses working in internal medicine, surgery, intensive care departments, emergency clinics, and polyclinic services at the Faculty of Medicine, Necmettin Erbakan University. The sample consisted of 200 nurses whose verbal and written consents were obtained to participate in the research. Institutional permission was obtained from the Provincial Health Directorate and ethical approval was obtained from the Non-Interventional Research Ethics Committee before the data collection. Data was collected through the Nurse Information Form, the Ethical Values Predisposition Scale, and the Nurses' Quality of Work Life Scale. The Windows 10 application SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) was used to analyze the research data. 79% of the participants are female, with an average age of 31.67±7.34, 51% of them are single, 62% of them hold a bachelor's degree, 74.5% of them work as clinical nurses, 70.5% of them have one to ten years of work experience, and their average working time is 9.02±7.80; 38.0% of the participants work in hazardous environments like emergency rooms, operating rooms, and intensive care; 62.5% of the participants are on shift basis; 40% of them work 40 hours or less per week; 57% of them declare that the field they work in is not their choice; 88.5% of the participants received ethics training, but 90.5% of them do not adhere to any ethical publications. The average scores for the sub-dimension of the nurses' work-life quality scale were concluded respectively; the mean scores of Love-Respect were 4.44±.49, Justice-Honesty was 4.36±.64, Cooperation was 4.18±.73. Furthermore, the mean scores for the Ethical Values Disposition Scale sub-dimension were concluded respectively; the score was 4.20±.75 for nursing management, 4.37±.72 for working conditions, 4.25±.78 for institutional management policies, 4.24±.82 for physical conditions, and 4.03±.84 for social opportunities and working environment. A statistically significant relationship was found between the nurses' work-life quality scale total score and the ethical values disposition scale total score (p<0.05). It has been discovered that unfavorable working conditions for nurses affect their inclination toward moral values.