trauma of sexual harassment and its mental health consequences among nurses

ABSTRACT

To determine the prevalence of sexual harassment in nurses and to observe its correlation with negative mental health [depression, anxiety and stress]. Further to examine the role of sexual harassment as a predictor of negative mental health in nurses and to explore the differences in the experience of sexual harassment, depression, anxiety and stress between junior and senior nurses. Cross-sectional descriptive study. Public Sector Hospitals in Lahore, from December 2011 to March 2012. A sample of 200 nurses with age range 23 to 46 years was obtained. Assessment tools used in the study were Sexual Harassment Experience Questionnaire [SHEQ] by Kamal, and Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale [DASS] by Lovibond and Lovibond. Mean age of the nurses was 29.80 +/- 7.10 years. Among these 63% were married and 37% unmarried. The mean working experience of nurses was 13.7 +/- 3. 52 years and their mean monthly income was 27820 +/- 13687.32 rupees. Their working hours ranged from 8 to 16 hours [M = 8.32, SD = 2.12]. The mean prevalence of sexual harassment was 71.66 +/- 19.01. A significant positive correlation of sexual harassment with depression, anxiety, stress and combined effect of them [DASS] was found. Multiple regression analysis showed sexual harassment as significant predictor of depression [[beta] = 0.47, p < .001], anxiety [[beta] = 0.43, p < .001] and stress [[beta] = 0.45, p < .001] in nurses. Sexual harassment was found to be a predictor of negative mental health in the form of depression, anxiety and stress in nurses of public hospitals