Nurses failing their own health checks, according to new national study

Many Australian nurses have failed their own health-check, according to research from Southern Cross University.

Kay Ross and Dr Jennie Barr, from the School of Health and Human Sciences, have completed a national survey on the health and wellness of nurses. More than 6000 nurses responded to the survey from all States and Territories across Australia. The research was supported by funding from the Australian Government under the Chronic Disease Prevention and Service Improvement Fund. The report is called ‘Primary health care for nurses: Developing strategies for the Prevention of Chronic Illness in Nurses’.

“Not surprisingly, many nurses feel that they are ‘unhealthy’ with stress identified as the biggest contributing factor to obesity, hypertension, respiratory disease, musculoskeletal problems, being at risk of developing type 2 diabetes and ‘not looking after myself properly’,” Ms Ross said.

“Bullying was also identified as a workplace issue that contributed to stress and being unhealthy. Many nurses also expressed concern about their workload, the impact of job losses and not being able to give their patients the care that they need.”

There are more than 300,000 nurses working in Australia but little research has been completed about their health and wellbeing and how it can impact patient care.

“Nurses are an ageing workforce, with respondents also concerned about the number of nurses aged over 50 years working part-time and looking at retirement within the next 10 years,” Ms Ross said.

“According to census data from 2005, 35 per cent of registered nurses were aged over 50, while the average age of a registered nurse is now 45. Chronic illness is a major concern for the workforce.”

The survey showed that many nurses reported having a chronic illness that resulted in them needing to take time off work in the previous 12 months. Furthermore, three per cent of respondents had been diagnosed with Type II diabetes, while a large number were at high risk of developing the disease within the next five years; these figures were calculated using ‘The Australian Type II Diabetes Risk Assessment Tool’.

“Participants were asked to rate the overall health of Australian nurses. The results suggest that the overall health of nurses fell between poor and average. Only a small number believed their overall health was good or very good,” Ms Ross said.

The research also recorded perceptions about nurses being role models to patients especially when talking about lifestyle risk factors such as stress, physical activity, smoking, alcohol consumption and nutrition. Most respondents felt that nurses should be role models for patients and that when talking about lifestyle choices, they needed to be healthy as well.

Photo: Kay Ross.