How to prevent burnout in healthcare workers
Burnout in healthcare staff
Burnout is a workplace-specific stress condition which results in feeling physically and mentally exhausted, losing motivation or positivity for your job and affects performance at work. It can also be linked to an increase in physical illness and leaving your profession. Burnout is common across healthcare staff due to a combination of high workloads, low pay and a sense of lack of control over your role and progression. Relationships with colleagues and supervisors are thought to be vitally important in preventing or contributing to burnout.
If you are experiencing burnout you might find that it is impacting other areas of your life such as your hobbies, relationships or wider mental health. It may be that you struggle to understand where burnout ends and depression begins.
Tips for preventing burnout in healthcare workers
If you are a healthcare worker or work for an organisation that supports healthcare workers, try the following strategies to prevent burnout:
Seek / offer support: it’s thought that relationships are key to preventing burnout in healthcare workers. A team who actively support each other both practically (for example, covering clinics on busy days) and emotionally (for example, asking ‘how are you?’ and listening to the answer) may be less likely to struggle with burnout. This effect can be even stronger if the leadership team supports the team in the same way and receives the same support themselves.
Encourage breaks: take your breaks and annual leave and support those around you to do the same. These breaks are essential for your mental health and therefore essential for productivity and patient safety and outcomes. Try to ensure you fully switch off from work when away from it and limit overtime only to what feels manageable and helpful to you personally.
Facilitate democracy and growth: people can be less likely to experience burnout if they feel in control at work. A dictatorial leadership style could be associated with more burnout than a democratic style. While it may seem difficult to be democratic within the hierarchy of health settings, it is possible. Consider activities such as booking shifts, allocating duty roles and deciding who does which tasks on a ward or in a clinic. If the clinicians themselves can have a role in choosing these aspects then they may be more satisfied with their roles and burnout may be less likely. Additionally, leadership teams may find that clinicians who are encouraged and supported in Continuing Professional Development may be less likely to experience burnout or leave their roles. This may be due to feeling more valued by the organisation.
Burnout UK was founded by Dr Julie Hannan and provides online courses for people to overcome and prevent burnout. Courses are written by Psychologists and approved by the British Psychological Society. Courses help you identify stressors that you face in your work and home life that might be contributing to your burnout and reshape areas of your life which are depleting you by developing new strategies to support your recovery and strengthen your resilience and wellbeing for the future.
