Advantages of the Variable Shift System, and Effective Use of Break Time to Better Support the Work Engagement of Nurses on Extended Day Shifts.

Objectives: The aim of this study is to clarify factors that support the work engagement of nurses, who bear the burden of extended day shifts, by focusing on the advantages of the variable shift system and workday break activities.

Methods: Nurses who were working under a variable shift system were asked to complete a self-report questionnaire to examine the workload, work engagement, work stressors, stress-coping strategies, and stress-coping break time activities, as well as the advantages and disadvantages of the variable shift system. Nine break activities were classified into the following four categories: social activities, rest/relaxation, entertainment, and cognitive activities. The advantages or disadvantages of the variable shift system were scored by developing composite variables using principal component analysis. These variables were used to perform a multiple regression analysis with work engagement as the dependent variable.

Results: The advantage score was the variable most strongly correlated with work engagement. In contrast, "Quantitative workload" was negatively correlated with work engagement. Among break activities, in the social activities category correlations were observed in "Both conversation and Email/SNS" and "Conversation only". Although in fact most nurses chose conversation as one of the break options, more than half of the nurses selected rest/relaxation as their ideal break activity.

Conclusion: Our study suggested that the variable shift system supported the work engagement of nurses who worked extended day shifts. The results also suggested that it would be useful to arrange the employee lounge environment so that employees could freely choose between "conversation" or "taking a rest" depending on the circumstances.