Professor Desley Hegney, Associate Professor Don Gorman, Ms Cath Rogers-Clark, Ms Alexandra McCarthy
This paper reports the results of the first descriptive research study, using a cross-sectional survey design, to gather data from nurses who had left rural and remote area Health Service Districts of Queensland Health which were experiencing higher than State average turnover rates during the period February 1999 to May 2000.
The main aim of the study was to answer the research question: 'why are nurses leaving employment in rural and remote areas of Queensland?' To do this, the study determined what factors influenced leaving; what factors would influence them to stay and what factors are not considered important to leaving or staying in rural/remote area nursing. This paper reports on the factors the participants believed influenced them to leave rural and remote area nursing in Queensland.
A mail survey method was used and each questionnaire included both quantitative and qualitative components. The five major factors influencing decisions to leave were 'management practices within the health facility'; 'emotional demands of work'; 'workplace communication'; 'management recognition for my work'; and 'family responsibilities'.
Whilst the findings cannot be generalised fully to the Australian workforce or to non- Queensland Health employees in Queensland, the study confirms some previous findings from previous research reports and provides new information considered, by this census of nurses, to be factors not important to leaving.