Objective: to analyze the relationship between exposure to workloads and presenteeism among nursing workers in the socio-environmental context of university hospitals.
Method: this is a quantitative, cross-sectional and analytical study with 355 nursing workers from two university hospitals in southern Brazil. Data were collected from November 2019 to February 2020. The Workload Scale in Nursing Activities and the Work Limitations Questionnaire were used. Descriptive statistics, variance analysis and Pearson's correlation test were used.
Results: there was a significant correlation between chemical loads and time management; biological loads and time management, physical demand and productivity loss; physiological loads and mental and interpersonal demand, production demand and loss of productivity; psychological loads and production demand.
Conclusions: there is a relationship between workloads and nursing presenteeism, verified by limitations and loss of productivity.