{"id":65756,"date":"2025-05-01T13:19:16","date_gmt":"2025-05-01T13:19:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/65756\/"},"modified":"2025-05-01T13:19:16","modified_gmt":"2025-05-01T13:19:16","slug":"its-time-we-stopped-blaming-nhs-staff-for-burnout-we-need-structural-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/65756\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s Time We Stopped Blaming NHS Staff For Burnout \u2013 We Need Structural Change"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cNHS staff are absent from work due to illness at twice the national average, costing the NHS \u00a312.1 billion a year,\u201d Dr Cath Taylor,<\/a> professor of healthcare workforce organisation and wellbeing at the University of Surrey<\/a>, tells HuffPost UK. <\/p>\n

The professor is a co-principal investigator of a five-year project<\/a>, led by the University of Surrey, to help address the \u201cunacceptable\u201d rates of stress, trauma, and burnout among health and social care workers. <\/p>\n

Supported by a \u00a35 million grant from the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), the researchers will work alongside NHS trusts and other universities to shift the responsibility of staff\u2019s mental health from individual health or social care workers to the NHS as a whole.<\/p>\n

So, we thought we\u2019d ask Dr Taylor and Dr Jill Maben<\/a>, co-principal investigator of the project and professor of health services research and nursing at the University of Surrey, about what that might look like.<\/p>\n

The researchers don\u2019t think mindfulness courses are the answer <\/strong><\/p>\n

Researchers have been looking into why NHS workers\u2019 mental health has been suffering for \u201cdecades,\u201d the experts say. <\/p>\n

And while the university\u2019s most recent research \u2013 the Care Under Pressure Programme<\/a> \u2013 suggests the causes of \u201cpoor psychological well-being\u201d are systemic and need organisation-level solutions, both professors think this isn\u2019t the approach the NHS is taking at the moment.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe research has remained \u2018individual\u2019 focused \u2013 recommending for example resilience or mindfulness courses\u201d for staff struggling under system-wide pressures.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a need for a step-change approach to tackling this challenging issue,\u201d they say.<\/p>\n

As a part of their Care Under Pressure 2 study, the researchers spoke to NHS health and social care staff who had worked in the institution during Covid. <\/p>\n

\u201cMany of their stories stuck with us, including those who said they would never forget the deaths of some patients and colleagues in Covid and who said they were forever altered,\u201d both principal investigators said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey needed to support each other and talk together to process the challenges of their work.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first 18 months of the project will be spent working out what the research needs to focus on most, and how information can be collected and shared so that staff (including those often left out of large-scale discussions) are included.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will be working in true partnership with NHS frontline staff\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n

When I asked how the researchers planned to balance their changes against the NHS\u2019s material challenges (like long hours and low pay<\/a>), both professors gently corrected me. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe first critical point to note is that these will not be \u2018our\u2019 changes (the research team) but we will be working in true partnership with NHS frontline staff and managerial leaders to determine what to implement, how, when and for whom,\u201d they write. <\/p>\n

The research, which began on 1 March this year and will continue \u2019til 2030, \u201cenables us to bring together the best evidence and academic expertise, with clinical frontline expertise, including a goal to grow research knowledge and capability within the NHS to enable sustainability beyond our project.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt will be critically important to identify interventions that can be implemented and sustained despite the material challenges faced by the NHS currently, and our partnership approach \u2013 ensuring co-design of the solutions \u2013 will enable us to do this,\u201d they continue.<\/p>\n

Help and support:<\/strong><\/p>\n