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Nursing Ethics
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*Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome
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Factors Predicting Nurses' Consideration of Leaving their Job During the Sars Outbreak

Judith Shu-Chu Shiao

School of Nursing, National Taiwan University, and Center for Medical Employee Safety and Health, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC

David Koh

Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore

Li-Hua Lo

College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan, ROC

Meng-Kin Lim

Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore

Yueliang Leon Guo

Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Section 1, Jen-Ai Road, Taipei 10051, Taiwan. Tel: +886 2 3322 8215; Fax: +886 2 2394 7998 leonguo{at}ha.mc.ntu.edu.tw

Taiwan was affected by an outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in early 2003. A questionnaire survey was conducted to determine (1) the perceptions of risk of SARS infection in nurses; (2) the proportion of nurses considering leaving their job; and (3) work as well as non-work factors related to nurses' consideration of leaving their job because of the SARS outbreak. Nearly three quarters (71.9%) of the participants believed they were 'at great risk of exposure to SARS', 49.9% felt'an increase in workload', and 32.4% thought that people avoided them because of their job; 7.6% of the nurses not only considered that they should not care for SARS patients but were looking for another job or considering resignation. The main predictors of nurses' consideration of leaving their job were shorter tenure, increased work stress, perceived risk of fatality from SARS, and affected social relationships. The findings are important in view of potential impending threats of pandemics such as avian influenza.

Key Words: infectious disease outbreak • leaving the job • SARS

Nursing Ethics, Vol. 14, No. 1, 5-17 (2007)
DOI: 10.1177/0969733007071350
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