JOB SATISFACTION AMONG DEGREE NURSES WORKING IN CLINICAL AREA AT HOSPITAL UNIVERSITI SAINS MALAYSIA, KUBANG KERIAN, KELANTAN

Abstract

Up gradation in terms of qualifications and expertise are certainly important factors contributing to the development of the nursing profession. However, some nurses after receiving their degrees have voiced their intent to leave Hospital Universiti Sains Mal ysia and move to other institutions because of its limited career development opportunities. The purpose of this quantitative study is to measure the job satisfaction among sixty six nurses holding degree certificate and working in clinical areas at Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia. Our findings showed that the six components that control the above mentioned criteria were pay, autonomy, task requirements, professional status, interaction and lastly organization policies, ranked from most important to least important. In contrast, pay was ranked as least satisfying followed by organizational policies, task requirements, autonomy, interactions and professional status as most satisfying component. The range of score for this study was l 05 to 178 with average total score of 139. The factor for Index Work Satisfaction that represents the importance of the components and current level of satisfaction was 12.42. These figures show low levels of satisfaction among the nurses. Comparison between the rankings according to levels of importance and levels of satisfaction demonstrated that while pay was ranked as the most important job component, it was ranked as the least satisfying component. This study presented findings that are essential to healthcare and nursing administrators to initiate interventions based on evidence with regards to the plight of degree nurses in their opportunities for career advancement.