Exploring the Relationship Between Emotional Intelligence and Job-Stress in Nursing Personnel

Background: The stressful environment of hospitals makes the work of nurses more challenging because of the excessive workload and continuous contact with human pain and death. This interface creates the need to develop emotional skills for the improvement of work performance and for good emotional health of workers. Aim: The present study aims to investigate the effect of emotional intelligence (EI) to job stress in the field of nursing. Material and Method: This is a systematic review of all research articles examining the relationship between emotional intelligence and job stress among nurses. The literature search was performed between October and November 2015 in the databases PubMed, Science Direct, Cochrane Library, Wiley online Library and the search engine Google Scholar from 1985 to 2016 with the following key words: "emotional intelligence", "nurses", "job-stress". Criteria for inclusion of studies was a clear correlation between EI and stress on nursing staff, the language –English or Greek– and studies related to professional nurses. Results: Οf the 134 published articles detected, 8 of them met inclusion criteria set for this review. It was found that the EI nurses have a direct impact on how to tackle stress as a protective factor against stress with high EI associated with lower stress and less burnout. The development of skills associated with EI may help workers cope more effectively their emotions, and thus directly reduce stress and hence the risks that exist for their health. Conclusions: So having high EI can help nurses face with greater skills various challenges as to reduce workplace stress and increase the efficiency. Focusing in this will be beneficial to nurses, patients, their employers, but also to whole health care delivery system.