Abstract
Aim
High turnover rates among service providers have burdened addiction treatment clinics and affected patient care and treatment outcome. In this study, we identified factors associated with providers’ turnover intention in Chinese methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) clinics.
Subjects and methods
This study used the baseline data from a randomized controlled trial conducted in 68 MMT clinics in five provinces in China. Service providers’ turnover intention, perceived risk at work, job satisfaction, years working in the clinic as well as sociodemographic characteristics were collected in the assessment. A logistic mixed-effects model was used to identify factors associated with providers’ turnover intention.
Results
Approximately one-third of these 418 service providers intended to change their job in this study. The findings of regression analysis showed that perceived risk at work was positively associated with the turnover intention (OR = 1.28; 95% CI: 1.17, 1.41) and job satisfaction was negatively related to the turnover intention (OR = 0.97; 95% CI: 0.95, 0.99).
Conclusion
Study findings highlighted the importance of addressing service providers’ perceived risk at work and job satisfaction to reduce turnover intention. Intervention strategies that focus on occupation safety and job satisfaction could be integrated into current training programs to maintain a stable workforce in the MMT programs.
Clinical trial registration details
This trial was registered at ClinicalTrials.gov.
Registration date: January 4, 2013. Identifier: NCT01760720.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Bellingham R (2004) Job satisfaction survey. Absolute Adavantage 3(5):28–31. https://www.welcoa.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/job_satisfaction_survey.pdf. Accessed 3 Feb 2020.
Bennett L, Kelaher M, Ross M (1994) The impact of working with HIV/AIDS on health care professionals: development of the AIDS impact scale. Psychol Health 9(3):221–232
Bride BE, Choi YJ, Olin IW, Roman PM (2015) Patient violence towards counselors in substance use disorder treatment programs: prevalence, predictors, and responses. J Subst Abus Treat 57:9–17
Cartwright WS, Solano PL (2003) The economics of public health: financing drug abuse treatment services. Health Policy 66(3):247–260
Chen S, Lin S, Ruan Q, Li H, Wu S (2016) Workplace violence and its effect on burnout and turnover attempt among Chinese medical staff. Arch Environ Occup Health 71(6):330–337
Cho YJ, Lewis GB (2012) Turnover intention and turnover behavior: implications for retaining federal employees. Rev Public Pers Adm 32(1):4–23
Duraisingam V, Pidd K, Roche AM (2009) The impact of work stress and job satisfaction on turnover intentions: a study of Australian specialist alcohol and other drug workers. Drugs 16(3):217–231
Eby LT, Burk H, Maher CP (2010) How serious of a problem is staff turnover in substance abuse treatment? A longitudinal study of actual turnover. J Subst Abus Treat 39(3):264–271
Garner BR, Hunter BD (2014) Predictors of staff turnover and turnover intentions within addiction treatment settings: change over time matters. Subst Abus 8:S17133
Garner BR, Knight K, Simpson DD (2007) Burnout among corrections-based drug treatment staff: impact of individual and organizational factors. Int J Offender Ther Comp Criminol 51(5):510–522
Han G, Jekel M (2011) The mediating role of job satisfaction between leader-member exchange and turnover intentions. J Nurs Manag 19(1):41–49
Jackson TR (2002) Treatment practice and research issues in improving opioid treatment outcomes. Sci Pract Perspect 1(1):22
Knight DK, Broome KM, Simpson DD, Flynn PM (2008) Program structure and counselor–client contact in outpatient substance abuse treatment. Health Serv Res 43(2):616–634
Knudsen HK, Johnson JA, Roman PM (2003) Retaining counseling staff at substance abuse treatment centers: effects of management practices. J Subst Abus Treat 24(2):129–135
Knudsen HK, Ducharme LJ, Roman PM (2007) Research participation and turnover intention: an exploratory analysis of substance abuse counselors. J Subst Abus Treat 33(2):211–217
Li L, Lin C, Wu Z, Wu S, Rotheram-Borus MJ, Detels R, Jia M (2007) Stigmatization and shame: consequences of caring for HIV/AIDS patients in China. AIDS Care 19(2):258–263
Li J, Wang C, McGoogan JM, Rou K, Bulterys M, Wu Z (2013a) Human resource development and capacity-building during China's rapid scale-up of methadone maintenance treatment services. Bull World Health Organ 91:130–135
Li L, Wu Z, Liang LJ et al (2013b) An intervention targeting service providers and clients for methadone maintenance treatment in China: a cluster-randomized trial. Addiction 108(2):356–366
Li L, Comulada WS, Lin C, Hsieh J, Luo S, Wu Z (2017) Factors related to client satisfaction with methadone maintenance treatment in China. J Subst Abus Treat 77:201–206
Li L, Liang LJ, Lin C, Feng N, Cao W, Wu Z (2019) An intervention to improve provider-patient interaction at methadone maintenance treatment in China. J Subst Abus Treat 99:149–155
Lin C, Wu Z, Rou K, Pang L, Cao X, Shoptaw S, Detels R (2010) Challenges in providing services in methadone maintenance therapy clinics in China: service providers’ perceptions. Int J Drug Policy 21(3):173–178
Lin C, Tuan NA, Li L (2018) Commune health Workers' methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) knowledge and perceived difficulties providing decentralized MMT Services in Vietnam. Subst Use Misuse 53(2):194–199
Lu H, Zhao Y, While A (2019) Job satisfaction among hospital nurses: a literature review. Int J Nurs Stud 94:21–39
McKay JR (2009) Continuing care research: what we have learned and where we are going. J Subst Abus Treat 36(2):131–145
Pang L, Hao Y, Mi G et al (2007) Effectiveness of first eight methadone maintenance treatment clinics in China. Aids 21:S103–S107
Price JL, Mueller CW (1981) A causal model of turnover for nurses. Acad Manag J 24(3):543–565
Rothrauff TC, Abraham AJ, Bride BE, Roman PM (2011) Occupational turnover intentions among substance abuse counselors. J Subst Abus Treat 40(1):67–76
Tang S (2015) Factors associated with effectiveness of methadone maintenance treatment in Yunnan Province of China. Dissertation, University of California Los Angeles
UNAIDS (2015) China AIDS response progress report 2015. https://www.unaids.org/sites/default/files/country/documents/CHN_narrative_report_2015.pdf. Accessed 7 Nov 2019
Wu LX, Qi L, Li Y (2016) Challenges faced by young Chinese doctors. Lancet 387(10028):1617
Yin W, Hao Y, Sun X et al (2010) Scaling up the national methadone maintenance treatment program in China: achievements and challenges. Int J Epidemiol 39(suppl_2):ii29–ii37
Zhang L, Zhang D, Chen W, Zou X, Ling L (2013) High prevalence of HIV, HCV and tuberculosis and associated risk behaviours among new entrants of methadone maintenance treatment clinics in Guangdong Province, China. PLoS One 8(10):e76931
Zhang F, Luo Z, Chen T, Min R, Fang P (2017) Factors affecting turnover intentions among public hospital doctors in a middle-level city in Central China. Aust Health Rev 41(2):214–221
Zhuang X, Liang Y, Chow EP, Wang Y, Wilson DP, Zhang L (2012) HIV and HCV prevalence among entrants to methadone maintenance treatment clinics in China: a systematic review and meta-analysis. BMC Infect Dis 12(1):130
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge the project team members in China for their contributions to this study.
Funding
Research reported in this paper was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health (award number R01DA033130) and National Institute of Mental Health of the National Institutes of Health (award number P30MH058107).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
All authors contributed to the article and approved the final article. Jun Chen analyzed the data, interpreted the outcomes and wrote the article. Chunqing Lin participated in interpreting the outcomes and writing the article. Wei Cao assisted with summarizing the literature and writing the article. Zunyou Wu assisted with overseeing the implementation of the intervention trial. Li Li was responsible for conceptualizing and designing the whole study and writing this article.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Ethical approval
All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional research committee (the University of California Los Angeles and National Center for AIDS Prevention and Control, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention) and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.
Informed consent
Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
Additional information
Publisher’s note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Chen, J., Lin, C., Cao, W. et al. Turnover intention among service providers in Chinese methadone maintenance treatment clinics. J Public Health (Berl.) 29, 979–984 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10389-020-01211-4
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10389-020-01211-4