Assessment of Working Time Pattern for Hospital Nurses

Objective: The aim of this study is to investigate the working time patterns including length, shift type, shift intensity, and special aspects of working hours for hospital nurses. Background: Working time patterns, such as long working hours and shift work with night shift, are important public health issue. However, most of the previous studies were based on the self-report data, and only a few studies have attempted to comprehensively estimate the working time pattern by considering various aspects of work. Method: The work schedule of a total of 1,254 nurses who worked at a general hospital in 2017, were analyzed using the electronic data recorded in the computerized system. We examined 15 potentially health-relevant working time factors for nurses, categorized under four main domain heading of: (1) Time of the day, (2) length of working hours, (3) shift intensity, and (4) special aspects of working hours. Results: Among a total of 1,254 nurses, most nurses (82.4%) were work with 3-shift type. 2-shfit nurses had 32.3±24.3% of the experience of more than 40 hours a week, followed by 3-shift nurses (22.5±18.7), and daytime nurses (14.7±11.6). But the experience of three consecutive night shift spells were higher among 3-shift (4.1±6.2 times) than 2-shift nurses (0.3±0.5), and the experience of working on weekend or legal holiday was higher in 3-shift nurses (42.9±23.2%) than 2-shift (36.6±17.9) and daytime (12.7±11.3) nurses, while the number of having more than three consecutive free days was lowest in 3-shift nurses (8.9±6.0 times) compared with 2-shift (21.3±12.6) and daytime nurses (10.3±5.9). Conclusion: 3-shift nurses had less long working hours, but high shift intensity and disadvantageous social working conditions than 2-shfit nurses, and 2-shift nurses worked with night shift and had long working hours, high shift intensity, but advantageous in social aspects than daytime nurses. Application: The results of this study might help to improve understanding of working time pattern in hospital nurses, and lay an important foundation for further research on health of nurses in Korea.