Meaning, Joy, and Critical Care Nurse Well-Being: A Call to Action

Abstract

Healthy nurses are essential for optimizing population health, patient care experiences, and health care cost-efficiency. Critical care nurses are at increased risk of developing physical and psychological symptoms due to their high-stress work environment and exposure to traumatic events. There is growing recognition for the value of implementing nurse-centered, team-based, and organizational-wide levels of intervention designed to mitigate the impact of high work stress and trauma on health professionals. The central assertion of this article is that meaning and joy in nursing practice are contributors to professional well-being and part of the solution for achieving the quadruple aim.

Keywords: Burnout; Critical care nurses; Meaning and joy; Quadruple aim.