Turnover Intention and Organizational Commitment of Primary Healthcare Nurses

Turnover intention is a predictor of the decision to leave an organization, which, if carried out, affects the quality of care provided. There is an association between turnover intention and organizational commitment. The more committed nurses are to the unit in which they work, the more committed they become to the unit’s organizational goals; thus, they tend to continue working for the organization. Aiming to assess the turnover intention and the organizational commitment of nurses in primary healthcare, we conducted a quantitative, observational, descriptive, and cross-sectional study. The Intention of Turnover Scale and the Organizational Commitment Scale were applied in a sample of 297 nurses. Data were analyzed based on descriptive statistics. About 92.8% of the nurses intend to stay at their current workplace and only 7.3% plan to leave soon, suggesting low turnover intention; 84.5% of the nurses are willing to make an effort beyond what is normal to help their organization succeed, and 88.7% feel really interested in the destiny of the organization, which shows high organizational commitment. Pearson’s Coefficient revealed the existence of a significant negative correlation between the factors “Intention to leave” and “Committed to the organization” (r = −0.51, p < 0.01). These findings suggest that, when nurses are more committed to their work and to the organization, they display less intention to leave, keeping the teams committed and motivated towards the organizational goals Our findings may guide nurse managers and policy-makers to develop strategies that retain nurses in organizations, keeping them motivated and engaged, and focusing on higher organizational commitment due to the influence it may have on the turnover intention.