Background: The multitude of negative consequences of nurse burnout calls for interventions to protect the well-being of the individual nurses, patients, and hospital organizations. However, much is still to be discovered about the development of this complex psychological syndrome.
Purpose: This study aimed to describe the development of nurse burnout for a population of Flemish hospital nurses while considering vulnerability and situational stressors as indicated by the vulnerability-stress model.
Methods: Ten registered nurses were enlisted for semistructured interviews through purposive sampling. All selected nurses were currently suffering from burnout, showed a burnout risk, or had gone through a burnout in the past. A descriptive thematic analysis was performed with themes inductively emerging from the data.
Results: Four main themes emerged: "being passionate about doing well or being good," "teamwork," "manager," and "work and personal circumstances." More specifically, it was the discrepancy between the first individual vulnerability factor and the three situational stressors that led to feelings of stress and burnout.
Conclusions: The essence of the development of nurse burnout was found in the discrepancy between individual vulnerability and situational stressors. Therefore, we recommend burnout prevention to target both factors.
Keywords: Burnout; nurse; qualitative research; stressor; vulnerability.