PURPOSE
The purpose of the study was to explore how hospital nurses decide to quit working as professional nurses using the grounded theory method. METHOD: The data was collected by individual in-depth interviews with 12 hospital nurses who recently resigned from work and it was analyzed using 'constant comparative analysis.' RESULT: The core category that emerged was "in search of new balance with self, work, and family". Three stages were identified: 1) "unconditionally accepting the working situation of itself," 2) "weighing advantages and disadvantages of working as a hospital nurse", and 3) "redesigning a future". Each stage contains three major strategies. The major strategies of the first stage are "maintaining a learning attitude", "enduring physical burnout," and "enduring unfair interpersonal relationships". The second stage contains "identifying advantages of working", "identifying disadvantages of working", and "comparing the advantages with the disadvantages". Lastly, the third stage includes "reassessing the aim of life", "beginning to construct an alternative life", and "deciding to quit working at a certain point". CONCLUSION: The results of the study will help nursing administrators in designing and implementing an effective turnover prevention program for nurses by understanding more deeply the process of turnover phenomenon among hospital nurses.

PURPOSE
The purpose of this research was to describe how nurses in intensive care units (ICU) work.
METHOD
A total of 18 ICU nurses participated in the research. The data was collected through individual in-depth interviews and analyzed by grounded theory method using NUDIST 4.0 software program.
RESULTS
Three different patterns regarding nursing performance among ICU nurses were identified. These are 1) nursing performance of nurses who perform excellently, 2) nursing performance of nurses who do not perform well because of their lack of experience, and 3) nursing performance of nurses who do not perform well in spite of their good years of experience. These three different nursing performances were described in terms of seven different categories; 1) assessing and monitoring nursing problems, 2) clinical decision making, 3) interpersonal relationships, 4) holistic care, 5) technical skills, 6) problem solving, 7) working independently and creatively. This study also identified two intervening factors that influenced the advancement of their expertise.
CONCLUSION
The results of this study might help nurse managers in developing continuing educational programs for inexperienced nurses or those nurses not performing well to become experts by a deeper understanding of the nature of nursing performance and the factors that influence nursing performance in ICU settings.