This cross-sectional study investigated the relationship between job stress and needlestick injury the nurses at a University hospital in Incheon, Korea.

A questionnaire survey was conducted targeting 476 nurses, of which 320 (67.2%) questionnaires were returned and 256 (53.8%) were regarded as being reliable data for analyses. We estimated the relation of job stress to needlestick injury using univariate and multiple logistic regression analyses.

One hundred sixty-five nurses (64.5%) had suffered at least one needlestick injury (included sharp injuries) during the previous year. After adjusting for potential confounders, we found that the high job control group was less likely than the other group to experience needlestick injury (OR=0.51, 95% CI=0.27–0.97). Job demand and social support, however, were unrelated to needlestick injury. The high job strain group was more likely to experience needlestick injury (OR=2.57, CI=1.13–5.83) than the low job strain group.

Our results tend to suggest that nurses who were in the low job control or high job strain status were more likely to suffer a high rate of needlestick injury.