Expressed emotion and burnout: the experience of staff caring for men with learning disability and psychosis in a medium secure setting

Abstract

This study examines the level of expressed emotion (EE) and burnout in staff caring for people with learning disabilities on a medium secure unit. The study aims to develop a baseline measure of EE and burnout in staff on the unit to be used for future service evaluation and to underpin interventions in the developing service based on psychosocial interventions. Ten staff participated in an audiotaped interview and completed a questionnaire. The Five Minute Speech Sample and Maslach Burnout Inventory were completed. High EE was evident in 31% of responses based on critical comments and negative relationships. Expressed emotion was higher in male staff and in Health Care Support Workers. No staff met all components for high burnout, but low personal accomplishment, high emotional exhaustion and high depersonalization were evident for some staff. There is evidence of high EE and some elements of high burnout within the staff team. A significant relationship was found between the level of high EE and the depersonalization element of burnout.

Can the job demand-control-(support) model predict disability support worker burnout and work engagement?

“…Studies show that 25% to 43% of DSWs (Chung & Harding, 2009;Robertson et al, 2005) report some form of emotional distress in the work place, with similar findings reported in other related worker populations such as aged-care workers and nurses (Hegney, Eley, Plank, Buikstra, & Parker, 2006;Lim, Bogossian, & Ahern, 2010). This emotional distress has been linked to issues that threaten service quality, for example, turnover resulting in continual workplace recruitment (Kozak, Kersten, Schillmöller, & Nienhaus, 2013), absenteeism resulting in staff shortages on shift (Harvey & Burns, 1994), and workers adopting poor care practices, for example, expressing negative emotion towards clients (Dennis & Leach, 2007).…”

Burnout symptoms in forensic psychiatric nurses and their associations with personality, emotional intelligence and client aggression: A cross‐sectional study

“…It is described as a stress-related syndrome which can have a major impact on the personal well-being of mental health nurses and quality of psychiatric care (McTiernan & McDonald, 2015;Volpe et al, 2014). Especially, psychiatric nurses have a higher risk of burnout than other nursing professions (Dennis & Leach, 2007;Gascon et al, 2013;Hanrahan, Aiken, McClaine, & Hanlon, 2010;Sahraian, Fazelzadeh, Mehdizadeh, & Toobaee, 2008). Several questionnaires on burnout have been developed, but the most often used questionnaire describes burnout on three scales: emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and decreased levels of personal accomplishment (Maslach, Jackson, & Leiter, 1996;Schaufeli, Maslach, & Marek, 2017).…”

What qualities are valued in residential direct care workers from the perspective of people with an intellectual disability and managers of accommodation services?

“…Hatton et al (2009) used a complicated, multiphase procedure to develop their job performance measures; replication of these findings would be difficult and timeconsuming. The scope of the Clarkson et al (2009) sample limits the generalisability of their results: all of the participants resided in the same forensic facility and it has been argued that organisational culture can impact levels of staff burnout and consequently the way in which staff interact with residents (Hatton et al 1997;Maslach & Goldberg 1998;Mitchell & Hastings 2001;Dennis & Leach 2007). With regards to the work done by FIELD (2006), sample bias may be reflected in the results due to the survey methods used (it relied on people's ability to read, write or have clear articulation in order to respond over the phone or in writing).…”