Evaluating Nurse Demands and Resources with Virtual Nursing to Mitigate Burnout

About This Grant

PROJECT ABSTRACT Importance: Healthcare settings are struggling to provide enough nurses to meet patients’ needs. About 40% of nurses reported high rates of burnout and leaving their positions prematurely. Burnout is driven by high job demands and limited organizational resources. Virtual nursing (VN), an organizational strategy borne of necessity to deliver patient care during the pandemic, was also viewed as an approach to potentially mitigate nurse burnout. To date, 43% of US hospitals have already implemented some form of VN, where remote nurses engage in team-based care using telehealth. Hypothetically, VN is expected to reduce the job demands for bedside nurses. However, little is known about the relationship between the use of VN and nurse job demands and resources. To address this knowledge gap, we will use a multi-site, natural experiment across nine diverse hospitals. Objective: Generate real-world, data-driven evidence on the job demands and resources, drivers of burnout, for bedside nurses who do and do not use VN. Specific aims: (1) Determine the association between the use of virtual nursing and workplace job demands among bedside nurses using EHR and survey data. (2) Determine the association between the use of virtual nursing and individual job demands among bedside nurses using eye-tracking technology and wearable devices. (3) Determine the job resources required to support VN and identify organizational solutions to mitigate nurse burnout using Design Thinking workshops. Methods: Guided by the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) framework and using a mixed-methods sequential design, we will examine the relationship between VN use and the job demands and resources that drive nurse burnout. First, we will use novel quantitative data (EHR and physiologic) to gain data-driven, real-world insights on job demands (e.g., time pressure, mental demand). Second, we will apply design thinking to understand the job resources needed to support VN and design organizational solutions that address systemic aspects of burnout. Expected outcomes: On successful completion of our research, we expect contributions to include to (1) understand the association between using VN and workplace job demands, (2) understand the association of using VN and nurse job demands for bedside nurses using physiologic data, and (3) determine the required organizational resources to better support bedside nurses using virtual nursing.