Working in healthcare is certainly not for the faint of heart. The doctors, nurses, paramedics, and other healthcare professionals in our hospitals today are constantly facing high-pressure, high-stakes situations — and their work undoubtedly takes a toll on their mental health.
How can mental health issues impact the healthcare workers in your office? What can you do to help them find a little peace? Here’s what you need to know.
The Facts
Healthcare has always been a stressful line of work. The very nature of the job requires long, unusual hours, uncooperative patients, and sometimes even life or death situations — hardly a walk in the park. It was not uncommon to hear of physicians and nurses suffering from burnout and losing their passion for their field due to all the stress.
And that was BEFORE the pandemic.
Now, there is no question that healthcare workers are suffering from a mental health crisis. According to a survey of healthcare workers by Mental Health America, 75% of workers reported feeling overwhelmed in recent months, 86% reported increased anxiety, and (perhaps most disappointingly) 39% of workers felt they didn’t have the adequate emotional support to deal with their current mental state.
The Dangers
So, what does all this mean?
Today’s healthcare workers are stressed, exhausted, and stretched too thin, and this can have significant impacts on the care they provide. In fact, a survey from Berxi revealed that one in three healthcare workers admitted to making more mistakes on the job since the pandemic began! This puts all your patients in greater harm and puts your facility at risk for all kinds of legal action.
The Solutions
If you want the patients in your facility to receive excellent care (and if you want to avoid lawsuits that arise from accidental malpractice), you need to give your workers the support they need to cope with the stress of working on the frontlines of a pandemic.
There are many ways to give your workers support. You can offer them free time with a counselor via remote sessions, or even assign each worker a buddy they can talk with each day about the stressors they’re facing. Sometimes, a listening ear can be hugely helpful in easing stress and avoiding burnout.
Teleradiology Solution
Another great option for helping your staff’s mental health is to lighten the load they have to carry. For example, you can outsource work for your radiology department to a teleradiology company. This can keep your radiologists from being stretched too thin, so they can provide your patients with the care and attention they deserve.
Visit our website today to learn more about teleradiology and how it can help your workers recover from some of their workplace stress. At Vesta, we offer fast turnaround times (TAT) to satisfy your patients’ needs as well as night coverage for STAT requirements.
