Structural relations between coping strategies and Burnout syndrome on health workers: A study of external and construct validity

The aim of this study was to validate hypothesized structural and functional relationships between coping strategies and factors associated with burnout syndrome in independent samples of health workers from different hospitals and hospital care settings. We applied the Maslach Burnout Inventory and the scale of Coping with Extreme Risks adapted to the Mexican population, we analyzed the responses of 354 health workers in a tertiary hospital and 300 from a reference hospital. The samples were intentional, non-probability, quota. The group was formed by nurses, paramedics, diagnostics services, physicians and resident physicians. Results confirmed the factor structure of the instruments in the twosamples and showed that the use of active coping strategies (control, information seeking, social support, among others) has protective effects on the factors associated withthe syndrome (emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and personal fulfillment at work), regardless of the sample, context and type of hospital care. We discuss the results andtheir implications in relation to external validity and findings in other related research.