Table 2.
Top five ranking items on the Moral Distress Scale-Revised (MDS-R) for physicians and nurses.
| Item no. | Distressing situation | Physicians
(n = 26) |
Nurses (n = 145) |
||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mean (SD) composite scorea | Rank | Mean (SD) composite scorea | Rank | ||
| 3. Follow the family’s wishes to continue life support even though I believe it is not in the best interest of the patient | 5.73 (5.01) | 1 | 6.52 (4.16) | 1 | |
| 4. Initiate extensive life-saving actions when I think they only prolong death | 5.04 (4.08) | 2 | 6.13 (4.32) | 2 | |
| 7. Continue to participate in care for a hopelessly ill person who is being sustained on a ventilator, when no one will make a decision to withdraw support | 4.58 (3.72) | 3 | 5.98 (4.69) | 3 | |
| 2. Witness healthcare providers giving ‘false hope’ to a patient or family | 4.04 (3.78) | 4 | 3.91 (3.64) | (8) | |
| 20. Watch patient care suffer because of lack of continuity | 3.46 (4.10) | 5 | 4.09 (4.46) | (7) | |
| 21. Work with levels of nursing or other care provider staffing that I consider unsafe | 3.12 (3.57) | (8) | 5.61 (4.68) | 4 | |
| 17. Work with nurses or other healthcare providers who are not as competent as the patient care requires | 2.77 (2.96) | (11) | 5.31 (4.68) | 5 | |
a
MDS-R composite score (range 0–16) = frequency score (range 0–4) × intensity score (range 0–4)