Working on the Edge: Stresses and Rewards of Work in a Front‐line Mental Health Service

Abstract

Supporting and listening to staff and allowing time for informal contact are valued by staff and enable the provision of empathic, compassionate services. Without space for reflection, staff groups may be vulnerable to the development and effects of unhelpful organizational defences, which reduce the effectiveness, quality and efficiency of caring services and increase perceived workplace stress. Services which foster staff engagement, ownership and creativity and employ "bottom up" approaches to service development are valued by staff and appear to increase staff morale and capacity to cope adaptively to change.

Resilience of primary healthcare professionals: a systematic review

“…The mean age of the health professionals studied was not reported in six studies; 7,8,11,14,18,19 in the remainder, ages ranged from 20-79 years (data not shown).…”

“…All included studies were published in the last 8 years, including six in 2013, [7][8][9][10][11]13 one in 2014, 12 and one in 2015 (Table 1). 14 Study designs varied: eight were quantitative, 7,[10][11][12][13][15][16][17] four were qualitative, 9,14,18,19 and one was an intervention study. …”

“…Published studies originated from a range of mostly high income countries: Australia (n = 3), 7,10,19 US (n = 3), 8,13,15 Germany (n = 2), 9,17 Sweden (n = 2), 12,16 UK (n = 1), 14 Canada (n = 1), 18 and South Africa (n = 1).…”

“…15 Qualitative studies described a range of mechanisms by which workload management was associated with perceived resilience, including delegation, boundary setting, etc. 9,14,18 Social, personal, and lifestyle factors associated with health professional resilience. Social, personal, and lifestyle factors that influence resilience were investigated in several studies.…”

“…14 The intervention study aimed to determine if teaching abbreviated mindfulness skills could improve resilience, quality of life (QOL), job satisfaction, and compassion. 8 Mindfulness meditation practices were taught over four time points and participants completed online outcome measures.…”