A Two-Day Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) Workshop Increases Presence and Work Functioning in Healthcare Workers

Abstract

Background In this controlled naturalistic study performed in healthcare workers we examined the effect of a two-day acceptance commitment therapy (ACT) workshop on work presence and productivity, i.e. the influence the workshop had on treatment efficacy in a routine hospital care setting. Aim To examine the influence of ACT on productivity and presence in healthcare workers. Method Study participants were all healthcare workers (nurses, medical doctors, physiotherapists, social workers, and art therapists) of four inpatient wards for depression. Half of the healthcare workers attended the workshop. Measures were evaluated 3 months after the intervention in the study participants and the patients treated by them in the same time period. Results A significantly higher treatment efficacy [as measured with HoNOS (Health of the nation outcome scales) change in the patients treated by the participants] has been observed in the healthcare workers who attended the ACT workshop when compared to the control group who did not attend the workshop. Moreover, the work presence of the participants of the ACT workshop was increased when compared with the time period before the intervention and with the presence of the control group. A cost analysis showed that ACT workshops lead to a significant return of investment for the employer as the costs for the workshop were ten times compensated by the increase of work presence in participants of the workshop. Conclusion These findings provide support that ACT interventions motivate healthcare workers to work and increase their patients’ treatment quality. To our knowledge this is the first study showing an ACT workshop in healthcare workers can influence HoNOS outcome in the treated patients.

A longitudinal analysis of the role of potentially morally injurious events on COVID-19-related psychosocial functioning among healthcare providers

“…A number of interventions focused on cognitive, behavioral, and social processes have been applied to the treatment of moral injury in warzone Veterans and Service-Members which may be relevant to helping healthcare providers respond to moral distress more flexibly [28][29][30]. Interventions, such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, which have been developed to target both psychosocial functioning in moral injury [27,28] and psychosocial functioning within healthcare providers [31,32], may be particularly beneficial.…”

Economic Evaluations of Mindfulness-Based Interventions: a Systematic Review

“…Thus, there were 41 studies included at this stage. At the final level of review for inclusion, 13 additional studies were excluded because the meditation component was mixed with other types of interventions (D’Amico et al, 2020 ; Doyle et al, 2019 ; Gaupp et al, 2020 ; Ljótsson et al, 2011 , 2014 ; Mercer et al, 2016 ; Orme-Johnson & Herron, 1997 ; Stahl et al, 2015 ; Sun et al, 2021 ), they were feasibility studies with only intervention costs (Hennelly et al, 2020 ; Tulloh et al, 2018 ), the effectiveness outcome included for cost-effectiveness calculation was not a health-related outcome (e.g., teaching competency as the effectiveness outcome; Crane et al, 2020 ), or the meditation intervention was not an MBI (Herron, 2011 ), leaving 28 studies meeting the criteria to be included in this study (Fig. 1 ).…”

Facing pandemic challenges: Helping health care professionals cope.

“…Scholars have consistently found support for ACT offered to health care professionals in 1- or 2-day workshops. Gaupp and colleagues (2020) demonstrated that a 2-day ACT workshop delivered to registered nurses and nursing assistants employed in a psychiatric setting improved patient scores on a clinician-rated measure of function and reduced workplace absences. Waters et al (2018) similarly determined that a 1-day ACT workshop resulted in lower self-reported scores on measures of psychological distress and cognitive fusion and higher scores on questionnaires assessing mindfulness and psychological flexibility at a 3-month follow up.…”

“…Patient surveys assessing experience of care, patient readmission rates, and 30-day mortality postdischarge might already be tracked by health care systems (Kelley & Gravina, 2017) and can be used to examine potential benefits. Data on employee retention and sick leave utilization (Gaupp et al, 2020) may provide information on health care professional well-being. Broader system data can be supplemented with targeted observation of key outcomes, such as adherence to safety procedures (Gravina et al, 2021) gathered via behavioral observation.…”