How Nurses Perceive Their Task Load when Caring for Behavioral Mental Health Patients in the Pediatric Emergency Department

Abstract

Introduction: Pediatric behavioral mental health patients are being seen more frequently in the emergency department setting. With this ever-growing number of cases comes the need for trained staff, including registered nurses, to care for these children during a mental health crisis. With this increase comes increased stress of nurses’ workload. The purpose of this project was to identify nurses’ perceptions of their workload when completing three identified tasks: communication, procedures, and initial intakes. Methods: The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Task Load Index tool was used to measure nurses’ perceptions of how difficult each task was to complete. Each task was compared to each other. A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was conducted to determine if there were statistically significant differences in the three task scores. A Spearman’s Rho test was conducted to measure the strength of association between the difference variables. Results: There was no statistical significance found when comparing communication (M = 11.77, 95% CI [12.39, 11.16], p = .113), procedures (M = 12.12, 95% CI [12.97, 11.27], p = .113), and initial intakes (M = 12.62, 95% CI [13.52, 11.73], p = .113). Discussion: Completing communication, procedures, and behavioral mental health patients in the pediatric emergency department. Pediatric emergency rooms should increase staff and staffing education, while decrease the nurses’ workload.

Key Words: Emergency department, Behavioral mental health, Pediatrics, Task load, Workload