Subjective Symptoms on Fatigue in Hospital Nurses

Kim, Shin Jeong; Sung, Myung Sook

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to get some basic data for health care for working women, especially for hospital nurses. the number of subjects was 796 nurses from one general hospital and four private educational hospitals. The data were collected from February to April, 1988 using the questionnaire "Symptom Table on fatigue Perception" designed by the Research Committee of Industrial Fatigue in Hygienic Association of Japan Industry. The collected data were analyzed using means and standard deviations for the subjective symptoms of fatigue and each item as an independent variable was analyzed by T-test and ANOVA test. The results are as follows: 1) The mean score for degree of fatigue was 1.89 and the degree of fatigue for physical symptoms had highest score of 2.04, the next was psychological symptoms at 1.89, and euro-sensory symptoms were the lowest ar 1.74. Among the fatigue symptoms, the item scored most frequently was "Legs feel heavy" with a mean score of 2.40 and the least frequent item was "My hand and foot trembled" with a mean score of 1.40/. 2) With the respect to the general characteristics of subjects, there were statistically significant difference according to age(F=17.039, p=.000), state of marriage(t=5.381, p=.000) presence of children(t=5.134, p=.000), clinical experience(F=16.663, p=.000), present position(F=12.598, p=.000), duty time(F=9.068, p=.000), monthly wages(F=7.361, p=.000), satisfaction about the pay and treatment at work(t=-5.511, p=.000), relation the doctors(t=-4.593, p=.000)