Assessment of Job Stress among Clinical Health Workers in Three Selected Health-care Industries in Lagos State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study was designed to empirically assess job stress in three selected health-care industries in Lagos State, Nigeria. Also, the study investigated the job stress related symptoms and means of controlling such among clinical employees in health-care industry. Two hundred and ninety randomly selected employees took part in the study. A valid and reliable instrument was used for data collection. This instrument was tagged Job stress and workers’ productivity (JSWP). Data analysis involved descriptive statistics and regression analysis as inferential statistics. The results showed that 86.2% of the sampled population in health-care industry experienced one form of job strain or the other, while 30.5% of the total variability of clinical employees’ job stress in health industry is accounted for by management action and discrimination at work (R2 = 0.305; F = 23.291, P > .05).This study further revealed the job stress related symptoms experienced by employees in health industry. It was further shown in this study that 6.9% depend on pills to reduce stress, 25.9% do exercise, and 44.8% relax on weekends, while 22.4% had no means of reducing stress. The study concluded that the concept of stress or job strain is highly relevant to the clinical workforce in health industry and if not  properly understood by the management board, its adverse effect on patient outcomes, patient safety, and quality care will be enormous.

Keywords: Job stress, Health-care industry, Employees, Symptoms, Management.