Nurses’ Deployment Risk And Resilience In Times Of War Conflicts: Checking The Status, Reporting The Future

Abstract

To date, year August, 2014, as Benghazi, Libya is in a time of conflict depicting a war zone environment, the researcher conducted a study to capture the moment and experiences of foreign national nurses currently deployed in the country performing their duties as healthcare providers. Despite the raised Alert level 4 warning given by the government, meaning "full evacuation mode" from Libya, most nurses refused to be repatriated and stayed to continue serving in Libya. A selected group of sixty-three (63) nurses of different nationalities, working in three (3) different hospitals at the heart of Benghazi, described their present deployment risk level and resilience. Deployment risk level is measured by the Deployment Risk and Resilience Inventory (DRRI) utilizing two of its subscales (C and G) - Difficult Living and Working Environment Scale (Deployment Environment) and the Perceived Threat Scale (Deployment Concern). On the other hand, resilience is measured by the Connor-Davidson Scale. Findings revealed lower risk at exposure to events or circumstances representing repeated or day-to-day irritations and pressures related to life, revealed more perceived threat, but highly resilient during deployment at the war zone. Furthermore, no correlation was found between deployment risk (deployment concern) and resilience, negative low correlation between deployment risk (deployment environment) and resilience, and no significant difference in resilience was observed between genders. Checking the nurses’ current status of deployment risk and resilience in Libya, gave light to future implications on nursing profession.