Other Titles
Rapid Presentation Round
Abstract
Nurses enter about 600-800 data points per 12-hour shift, an average of one data point every 1.11 minutes (Gesner et al., 2022). The nurse burnout rate of 38% is 10% higher than the national average and the cost of turnover equates to over $40,000 per bedside nurse (Gesner et al., 2022; Melnick et al., 2021). As evidenced by these key numbers, charting burden and burnout are significant in the nursing workforce, which is the largest population in the healthcare workforce (Gesner et al., 2022). Assessing and analyzing charting burden is a relatively new concept having just been researched and published in the past five years. Although the largest group of electronic health record users only 1 in 4 research articles on burden and burnout are related to nurses compared to physicians, making the topic of burden and burnout under-researched (Nguyen et al., 2021). However, charting is an increasing percentage of a nurse’s workload and directly competes with direct patient care so it must be given proper recognition and deserves further research. Charting burden has been associated with decreased time spent with the patient and high nurse burnout has been associated with higher healthcare-associated infection rates, worse perceived quality of care, poorer patient outcomes, and higher mortality rates through increased nurse-to-patient ratios (Melnick et al., 2021; Nguyen et al., 2021).
Current practice consists of a minimum of 5 mandatory individual notes with the two nursing assessments taking at least 30+ minutes each per patient to complete. Is the current charting system burdensome causing bedside nurse burnout?
A survey was sent out comprised of two validated measures, the BurDoNsaM scale and the abbreviated Maslach Burnout Inventory to assess whether there was charting burden and burnout respectively among bedside nurses (Brown et al., 2020; Shaikh et al., 2019). Of the 58 surveys returned, 56 were included in the analysis. The survey of current practice revealed that the current documentation system is burdensome and there are moderate to severe levels of burnout among the Medical Center bedside nurses. A workgroup has been established comprised of the author, an informaticist, and fellow inpatient nurses. The workgroup will research which modifications can be made to the current assessments while still following required standards. It will also seek input from key stakeholders such as the inpatient nurses and clinical nurse leaders to enact changes.
Notes
References:
1) Brown J. A., Cooper A. L., & Albrecht M. A. Development and content validation of the Burden of Documentation for Nurses and Midwives (BurDoNsaM) survey. Journal of Advanced Nursing. 2020;76(5):1273-1281. doi:10.1111/jan.14320
2) Gesner, E., Dykes, P. C., Zhang, L., & Gazarian, P. (2022). Documentation Burden in Nursing and Its Role in Clinician Burnout Syndrome. Applied Clinical Informatics, 13(5), 983–990. https://doi.org/10.1055/s-0042-1757157
3) Melnick, E. R., West, C. P., Nath, B., Cipriano, P. F., Peterson, C., Satele, D. V., Shanafelt, T., & Dyrbye, L. N. (2021). The association between perceived electronic health record usability and professional burnout among US nurses. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA, 28(8), 1632–1641. https://doi.org/10.1093/jamia/ocab059
4) Nguyen, O. T., Shah, S., Gartland, A. J., Parekh, A., Turner, K., Feldman, S. S., & Merlo, L. J. (2021). Factors associated with nurse well-being in relation to electronic health record use: A systematic review. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA, 28(6), 1288–1297. https://doi.org/10.1093/jamia/ocaa289
5) Perpetua, Z., Lennon, J., Shovel, J. A., Appell, K. E., Patterson, L., Martin, S. C., Minnier, T. E., Sackrowitz, R., Zapf, R. L., Kip, P. L., & McLaughlin, M. (2023). A Current State Assessment on Nursing Work Activities: An Observational Study. Journal of Nursing Care Quality, 38(4), 381–387. https://doi.org/10.1097/NCQ.0000000000000723
6) Shaikh, A. A., Shaikh, A., Kumar, R., & Tahir, A. (2019). Assessment of burnout and its factors among doctors using the abbreviated Maslach Burnout Inventory. Cureus, 11(2), e4101. https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.4101
Sigma Membership
Nu Psi
Type
Presentation
Format Type
Text-based Document
Study Design/Type
Other
Research Approach
N/A
Keywords:
Acute Care, Workforce, Stress and Coping, Burnout, Turnover
Recommended Citation
Alloo, Kelsey Elizabeth, "Charting Burden and Burnout" (2025). Creating Healthy Work Environments (CHWE). 138.
https://www.sigmarepository.org/chwe/2025/presentations_2025/138
Conference Name
Creating Healthy Work Environments
Conference Host
Sigma Theta Tau International
Conference Location
Phoenix, Arizona, USA
Conference Year
2025
Rights Holder
All rights reserved by the author(s) and/or publisher(s) listed in this item record unless relinquished in whole or part by a rights notation or a Creative Commons License present in this item record.
Review Type
Abstract Review Only: Reviewed by Event Host
Acquisition
Proxy-submission
Charting Burden and Burnout
Phoenix, Arizona, USA
Nurses enter about 600-800 data points per 12-hour shift, an average of one data point every 1.11 minutes (Gesner et al., 2022). The nurse burnout rate of 38% is 10% higher than the national average and the cost of turnover equates to over $40,000 per bedside nurse (Gesner et al., 2022; Melnick et al., 2021). As evidenced by these key numbers, charting burden and burnout are significant in the nursing workforce, which is the largest population in the healthcare workforce (Gesner et al., 2022). Assessing and analyzing charting burden is a relatively new concept having just been researched and published in the past five years. Although the largest group of electronic health record users only 1 in 4 research articles on burden and burnout are related to nurses compared to physicians, making the topic of burden and burnout under-researched (Nguyen et al., 2021). However, charting is an increasing percentage of a nurse’s workload and directly competes with direct patient care so it must be given proper recognition and deserves further research. Charting burden has been associated with decreased time spent with the patient and high nurse burnout has been associated with higher healthcare-associated infection rates, worse perceived quality of care, poorer patient outcomes, and higher mortality rates through increased nurse-to-patient ratios (Melnick et al., 2021; Nguyen et al., 2021).
Current practice consists of a minimum of 5 mandatory individual notes with the two nursing assessments taking at least 30+ minutes each per patient to complete. Is the current charting system burdensome causing bedside nurse burnout?
A survey was sent out comprised of two validated measures, the BurDoNsaM scale and the abbreviated Maslach Burnout Inventory to assess whether there was charting burden and burnout respectively among bedside nurses (Brown et al., 2020; Shaikh et al., 2019). Of the 58 surveys returned, 56 were included in the analysis. The survey of current practice revealed that the current documentation system is burdensome and there are moderate to severe levels of burnout among the Medical Center bedside nurses. A workgroup has been established comprised of the author, an informaticist, and fellow inpatient nurses. The workgroup will research which modifications can be made to the current assessments while still following required standards. It will also seek input from key stakeholders such as the inpatient nurses and clinical nurse leaders to enact changes.
Description
Charting burden and burnout are an under-researched yet significant issue in nursing. This evidence-based practice project utilizes a two-item validated survey to measure nursing charting burden and burnout. This project seeks to modify charting to decrease charting burden and burnout.