Linkage between role stress and work engagement among specialty nurses: a cross-sectional study of China

Objectives Specialty nurses play a significant role in improving patient care; however, little is known about the factors affecting their work engagement. This study aimed to explore the relationship between role stress and work engagement among specialty nurses in China.Design A descriptive, cross-sectional study was applied in this study.Setting The study was conducted in the Henan Provincial People’s Hospital in China.Participants From March to April 2023, we conducted a cross-sectional descriptive study, using convenience sampling to recruit 972 specialty nurses from 42 specialised fields in China.Methods An online questionnaire survey was conducted using the Basic Information Questionnaire, Role Stress Scale and Specialty Nurse Work Engagement Scale. The collected data were analysed by using SPSS 21.0 software. The differences in total work engagement scores between subgroups were investigated using a single-factor analysis of variance. A Spearman’s rank correlation and a Pearson’s correlation were used to determine the relationship between general information, role stress and work engagement. A ridge regression analysis explored the impact of role stress on work engagement.Results The total score of role stress was (52.44±19.92) and the total score of work engagement was (140.27±17.76). Among the scores of various dimensions of specialty nurses’ work engagement, the standardised score for work attitude was the highest (4.54±0.56), followed by work values (4.46±0.64); the standardised score of work enthusiasm and focus was the lowest (4.22±0.64). Additionally, role ambiguity (r=−0.352, p