Enhancing Resilience and Well-Being Among Nurse Leaders: A Randomized Controlled Trial of Mindfulness and Narrative Interventions

OBJECTIVE: Evaluate the short-term effectiveness of interventions to address nurse leader resilience and well-being. BACKGROUND: Nurse leaders face unique stressors in their role. Evidence-based, feasible interventions are urgently needed. METHODS: The study included 157 US nurse leaders, randomly assigned to 3 intervention groups (mindfulness, narrative, combined). Well-being and resilience were measured at baseline (T0), 1 week (T1), and 2 weeks (T2). RESULTS: Well-being scores showed significant improvement over time across all groups. Resilience scores increased from baseline to first follow-up but declined by the second follow-up. CONCLUSION: Low-resource interventions demonstrated short-term signals of effectiveness for improving nurse leaders' well-being over 2 weeks; resilience findings were mixed and not sustained by week 2. A longer follow-up is warranted before broad organizational adoption.