Somaye Zarei Fathabadi, Maryam Khosravizad, Maryam Damorchiloo, Masoumeh Damarloo Abhari,
Volume 14, Issue 2 (6-2026)
Objectives: Hospital environments, due to the nature of their services, are considered among the most stressful work settings, posing a serious challenge to the employees' mental health. This study aimed to design and test a structural model of psychological well-being among the clinical and administrative staff of Milad Hospital in Tehran. Given the study's focus on a specialized medical center, the results are more generalizable to similar hospital environments, and caution should be exercised when generalizing them to other sectors of the healthcare system.
Methods: This study employed a mixed-methods (sequential exploratory) approach. In the qualitative phase, using interpretive phenomenology and 16 in-depth interviews with experts, the study's main goal was to examine the impact of living environments. Data were analyzed using MAXQDA (version 2020). In the quantitative phase, based on the qualitative findings, a 30-item questionnaire was developed and distributed among 300 hospital employees. Data analysis and model fitting were performed using Covariance-Based Structural Equation Modeling (CB-SEM) in LISREL (version 8.8).
Results: In the qualitative phase of the study, three main themes—personality traits, psychological capital, and job stress—were identified, along with 30 sub-themes. Quantitative model testing indicated that the conceptual model demonstrated a good fit (χ²/df = 2.36, CFI = 0.93, RMSEA = 0.063). The findings confirmed that psychological capital (β = 0.48) and personality traits (β = 0.41) had positive and significant effects. In contrast, job stress (β = -0.33) had a negative and significant effect on psychological well-being (p < 0.001). Among these variables, psychological capital was the strongest positive predictor of psychological well-being.
Conclusion: The results of this study underscore the need to move from approaches based solely on efficiency and performance control (tool-based management) toward human-centered approaches in healthcare human resource management. This approach considers mental health, employees' lived experiences, and their psychological capital as key components in organizational decision-making and the design of workplace interventions. In this framework, strengthening psychological capital can serve as a balancing resource, reducing the negative effects of job stress and contributing to the sustainability of psychological well-being in hospital settings.
