Burnout, job satisfaction, and turnover intention among primary care nurse practitioners with their own patient panels

Background

Nurse practitioners (NPs) can enhance NP care and improve access to care by autonomously managing their patient panels. Yet, its impact on workforce outcomes such as burnout, job satisfaction, and turnover intention remains unexplored.

Purpose

To estimate the impact of NP panel management on workforce outcomes.

Methods

Structural equation modeling was conducted using survey data from 1,244 primary care NPs. NP panel management was categorized into co-managing patients with other providers, both co-managing and autonomously managing, and fully autonomous management.

Discussion

Fully autonomous management led to more burnout than co-managing (B = 0.089, bias-corrected 95% bootstrap confidence interval [0.028, 0.151]). Work hours partially (27%) mediated this relationship. This findings indicate that greater autonomy in panel management among NPs may lead to increased burnout, partially due to longer work hours.

Conclusion

Interventions to reduce work hours could help NPs deliver quality care without burnout.