Rajitha Bommakanti, Monique Bouvier, Melinda Higgins, Mary Gullatte

The Role of Rhythmic Breathing in Stress Reduction for Clinical Nurses

Tags: burnout nurse workload stress Stress among Nurses wellbeing yoga

Nursing workload has dramatically changed over the last twenty years. The job duties of acute care hospital medical surgical nurses have changed and has contributed to a shift in nursing well-being and overall work-related stress. A descriptive cross-sectional study was performed to teach acute care medical surgical nurses pranayama/rhythmic breathing to reduce stress and improve well-being. Well-being and stress surveys were collected pre and post intervention. The results of the surveys indicated the training with daily reminders for rhythmic breathing improved, as evidenced by improvements in World Health Organization- 5 Well-being index scores (WHO-5), while the stress surveys did not reveal significant changes. The results of this descriptive cross-sectional study revealed the simple intervention of teaching medical-surgical nurses rhythmic breathing has the potential to improve their overall well-being.