Relationships between resilience, empathy, compassion fatigue, work engagement and turnover intention in haemodialysis nurses: A cross‐sectional study

AIM: To explore the relationships between resilience, empathy, compassion fatigue, work engagement and turnover intention in Chinese haemodialysis nurses. BACKGROUND: Although several studies explored nurses' turnover intention in multiple hospital wards, fewer studies focused on turnover intention and its predictors among nurses in dialysis care. METHODS: We conducted a cross-sectional study and adopted a two-stage sampling method to recruit 528 Chinese haemodialysis nurses. Multiple regression analysis was performed to explore the effects of resilience, empathy, compassion fatigue and work engagement on turnover intention. RESULTS: The prevalence of high and exceptionally high levels of turnover intention was 59.1% and 9.0%. Compassion fatigue had the strongest significant effect on turnover intention (β = 0.276), followed by work engagement (β = -0.256) and resilience (β = 0.193). Haemodialysis nurses in tertiary hospitals reported significant higher levels of turnover intention than those in secondary hospitals (β = 0.127). CONCLUSIONS: Higher levels of compassion fatigue and lower levels of resilience and work engagement can result in higher turnover intention in haemodialysis nurses. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING MANAGEMENT: Strategies such as resilience training programme, mindfulness-based intervention and establishing a positive work environment may be effective methods to improve resilience, reduce compassion fatigue, promote work engagement and decrease turnover intention.