Objective

To determine the prevalence of burnout syndrome in the nursing staff in four hospitals located in the State of Atlántico (Colombia).

Material and Methods

A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted and included as participants 117 nursing professionals and 229 nursing auxiliaries from four hospitals located in the State of Atlantico (Colombia), two public and two privates. An anonymous self-study survey was used on sociodemographic, labor data and Maslach Scale.

Results

The overall prevalence of Burnout Syndrome or professional burnout was 65%. In nursing professionals it was 63,2% and in nursing auxiliaries 65,9%. At least 13,3% of the participants had a high degree of Burnout from emotional exhaustion, 9.2% for depersonalization, and 62,7% had low scores for personal fulfillment. In nursing professionals, 12,7% had a high score for emotional exhaustion, 7,4% for depersonalization, and 64,2% obtained low scores for personal fulfillment. On the other hand, in nursing auxiliaries the behavior in some subscales was very similar, 14,5% had a high score for emotional exhaustion, 12,8% for depersonalization and 59,8% had low scores for personal fulfillment.

Conclusions

The presence of burnout syndrome is high in the studied population, it is similar in both, nurses and nursing auxiliaries. The most affected dimension was the personal fulfillment in both groups, which corresponds to high feelings of the "burned".