When Laura-Jane Smith took time out of her clinical training for a PhD, she found she was constantly unhappy, and suffered from palpitations, nausea, severe headaches, and breathlessness among other physical symptoms.
The hospital doctor’s days were dominated by negative thoughts. She recalls: “I once walked for 30 minutes with ‘I hate my life. I hate my life’ on a loop of internal monologue that I feared had no end.” Eventually, Smith was diagnosed with depression and anxiety and ended up leaving the PhD.
She is not alone. Countless healthcare professionals suffer from burnout, depression, anxiety and addiction. Estimates from Public Health England put the cost to the NHS of staff absence due to poor health at £2.4bn a year – excluding the cost of agency staff to fill in gaps and the cost of treatment.
In his independent review looking at the impact of staff health on NHS performance, former medical director Steve Boorman, who is honorary professorial fellow of the Royal Society of Public Health, found that health workers often did not prioritise their own health. “They did not want to take time off as they felt patient care would suffer when temporary cover was needed to replace them,” he explains.
Dr Clare Gerada, medical director for the NHS Practitioner Health Programme, explains why this is so: “You only have to look at what you’re trained to do as a doctor or a nurse. You’re trained to put patients first and to put their needs above your own.”
NHS England now has a specific programme, supported by chief executive Simon Stevens, that advocates health checks, access to early physiotherapy and mental health support, and improvements in food available on site and staff vaccination uptakes. But Boorman admits that progress is inconsistent and staff health is still a low priority for leadership and for NHS staff themselves.
“Good staff health isn’t about token Zumba classes or lettuce leaves for the worried, but about helping people understand the impact poor health may have on themselves, their family and those around them – in the case of NHS workers, the vulnerable patients that need care,” he points out.
Smith, who is back at work after seeking help from the NHS Practitioner Health Programme and undergoing therapy, says that finding a space in life for creativity also helped her.
Anxious to prevent a relapse, she has made herself a number of promises: “I will take all my annual leave, I will say ‘no’ more often to extra work tasks, I will value activities that make me happy. By making time for the things that recharge me, I am now more effective – a better colleague and a better doctor.”
Burnout, depression and anxiety – why the NHS has a problem with staff health
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