Job stress, burnout and job satisfaction in staff working with people with intellectual disabilities: community and criminal justice care

The purpose of this paper is to examine and compare levels of burnout, traumatic stress and resilience amongst Norwegian nursing care staff in two intellectual disability (ID) services.

This was a cross-sectional survey in which 137 staff completed questionnaires measuring work-related stress, burnout, compassion and resilience. Two groups were compared; staff in the national forensic ID services and staff in the community ID caring services.

Nursing staff in the community ID caring services had significantly more signs of stress and burnout compared to the other group. At the same time they were more compassionate.

The different caring cultures examined in this study indicated that the forensic ID staff tended to focus on the physical aspects of the caring role whilst the community ID staff tended to focus on the relational issues. The impact of serious events resulted in a higher level of stress and burnout symptoms, however the community carers showed more compassion to their work.