The mental stress in the work of nurses: between the real and the prescribed

Abstract

It is a social research in the hospital organization that aims the articulation between the behavior of nurses and the collective of working. It has as study object the generating conditions and the manifestations of the mental stress in the development of the nurses work and as objectives: to characterize the work of nurses in the Medical Clinic Infirmaries, to identify the work conditions and to discuss the determinants of the mental stress in the work developed by nurses. It uses as theoretical support the Dejour’s Work’s Psychodynamics and the concept of mental stress from the theoretical construction of Seligman-Silva. The methodological orientation used in this investigation was based on the research-action and in the methodological development proposed by the Work’s Psychodynamics. Data have been submitted to the analysis of thematic content that has indicated the following categories: The Prescribed Work – crucial factor of the work organization; and the Real Work – response from nurses to the propositions of the prescribed work. One concludes that nurses, due to the mental stress in the work, do not outline any transformation action of their relation to the work organization. They perceive themselves as impotent, with the capability of affective mobilization blunt, incapable of surpass the cognitive mobilization that reduces them to the impotency.