Background: A registered nurse plays a very important role in the care taking of patients. For the nurses to maintain this special care, they need to have good physical and psychological health. They also need to have good management that listens to them and gives the guidance necessary.

Aim: To describe occupational stress among nurses.

Method: A literature review that includes articles about nurses working in different hospitals. A systematic search has been made through database CINAHL with various keywords to try to get articles that give answers to the aims of the study. This resulted in ten relevant articles. Results of these articles were analyzed according to Friberg’s 4-step method to create a new whole using themes and subthemes.

Results: The results of the study showed various causes of occupational stress among nurses. These results were displayed under three main themes which are stressful working conditions, situation of work overload and requirements and expectations. The reasons described were quite similar regardless of which units, hospitals, and country the nurses worked in. Commonly, shortage of staff and poor management were contributing factors to nurses’ occupational stress.

Conclusions: Nurses need support to be able to cope with their job without developing illness and/or causing absence from work. Furthermore, there is a need to develop a favorable working environment to keep nurses in the profession to be able to perform and maintain patient safety.