Explore
By the numbers
Two data sets, side by side: how common burnout actually is worldwide, and what US nursing's own regulators say is happening to the workforce because of it.
Global burnout prevalence
High emotional exhaustion33.45%
Depersonalization25.0%
Low personal accomplishment33.49%
Pooled across 80,314 nurses in 14 systematic reviews worldwide — Getie et al. (2025)
The US workforce exodus
RNs intending to leave within 5 years39.9%
Cite stress and burnout as the root cause41.5%
RNs currently employed in nursing87.7%
National Nursing Workforce Study, 2024 — NCSBN
138,000+
nurses left the US workforce between 2022 and 2024
22.7%
intend to leave nursing for reasons other than retirement
80,314
nurses worldwide included in the global burnout estimate above
NCSBN National Nursing Workforce Study, 2024; Getie et al., 2025
None of this stays theoretical at the bedside. Burnout is linked to higher rates of medication errors, patient falls, and hospital-acquired infections — which is what turns a workforce problem into a patient-safety one. Li et al. (2024)