American Research Journal of Nursing

Background: Job satisfaction and feelings of empowerment positively impact home health care nurses by improving patient safety and patient outcomes. The project objective determined whether an empowerment educational module improved the feelings of empowerment and job satisfaction of registered nurses at a home health care agency. Methods: A quantitative, pre-test/post-test research study was conducted to measure the success of an empowerment educational module. Laschinger’s (2008) Nursing Worklife questionnaire was administered to 92 participating nurses, 46 were assigned to an experimental group and 46 were assigned to a control group. Participants in the experimental group were queried about their perceptions towards empowerment in home health care environments and their reactions towards the teaching module. Results: The educational module did not significantly impact the participants’ sense of empowerment and seemed to weaken the empowerment at times, albeit in statistically insignificant numbers. Six themes emerged from this discussion.