Factors affecting work stress among emergency department staffs at Selayang Hospital

Employee work stress has increased significantly due to recent changes and new challenges in the lifestyles and work environments. If not properly managed, stress can negatively impact both productivity and the quality of work, and it can adversely affect the health and well-being of employees. Unlike typical workplace hazards such as neurotoxic agents and economic risks, stress has no job-specific limitations and can pose health risks to anyone. Therefore, this study was conducted with the intention to investitgate factors that might influence work stress among employees in the healthcare setting involving emergency department. The study examines the direct relationship between perceived organizational support, work overload, work environment, employee resiliency and work stress. In this study, the unit of analysis is the individual employees working in the emergency department, and a quantitative approach was employed by collecting data using a proportional stratified random sampling technique through an online survey. A cross-sectional design was used involving 129 employees from different positions working in the emergency department. In this study, hypotheses for direct effect were tested using multiple regression analyses. Three hypotheses were supported where perceived organizational support and work environment were found significantly negatively related to work stress. While, work overload was significantly positively related to work stress. The findings indicate that by having high organizational support, better working environment and lower workload may decreased employees’work stress in the hospital’s emergency department