The acute stressors of the pandemic may have settled but many health professionals are feeling prolonged stress and high levels of burnout. Dr Melissa Black explains.
Many of the stressors that we hear about at The Essential Network for Health Professionals (TEN) existed long before COVID-19 and will continue to exist afterwards, which is why looking after your own and colleagues’ mental health is so important.
The pandemic highlighted both the acute and ongoing mental health needs of health professionals. This cohort faces unique pressures and the mental health needs are constantly evolving. TEN was created by health professionals for health professionals, to address the need to access convenient, confidential support for mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.
To date, more than 75,000 health-care workers have visited the e-health hub via the Black Dog Institute website and over 16,500 digital mental health assessments have been completed.
The website provides a suite of mental health support resources and services, most of which can be accessed anonymously and at any time. Through this service, health professionals can choose combinations of care that match their individual needs including:
- A navigating burnout resource to help people to manage and minimise the impact of burnout in themselves and their colleagues. The course is divided into nine short sections so you can easily squeeze them into your day. Some sections take as little as 10 minutes to complete.
- Digital mental health check-up to assess your own levels of stress, depression, anxiety, burnout and traumatic responses and access suitable resources.
- Online fact sheets and resources covering a range of mental health, workplace and life stressors.
- Links to the Hand-N-Hand peer support network, a preclinical service connecting you to an individual or a group of peers for support.
- Access to the TEN clinical service, providing up to five confidential, one-hour sessions with a clinical psychologist or psychiatrist at Black Dog Institute. This is a free, confidential national service delivered via telehealth and health-care workers do not require a referral to access them.
Black Dog Institute clinical psychologists and psychiatrists have worked with over 200 health-care workers over the past few years to provide support and referrals for a range of difficulties. Burnout is the most common presentation, along with depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress, workplace difficulties, and family/relationship concerns.
Burnout is a form of exhaustion that’s largely caused by persistent stress at work. Symptoms include both emotional and physical exhaustion, low motivation or mood; feelings of isolation and disengagement; procrastination; irritability; and physical responses such as disrupted sleep, headaches and body pains. These symptoms can look like depression and anxiety but are primarily caused by workplace pressures.
Many of these health professionals have told us that that they were not comfortable accessing support through their workplace or traditional Medicare pathways, due to concerns about confidentiality, mandatory reporting and the stigma associated with seeking help.
As a national telehealth service, TEN provides support for health professionals all over the country – increasing access to mental health support for those who may not wish to speak to colleagues in their own communities and professional networks.
We often provide care for other health professionals, but also need to apply the same care to ourselves. Just like putting on your own oxygen mask first, looking after your own wellbeing allows you to be at your best for yourself, your patients, and your loved ones, and last the distance in our rewarding and taxing care professions.
The beginning of a new year is a great time to check in on how you best look after yourself, and this will look different for every person. It is important to work out what’s important to you in both your life at work and outside of work, and what fits with your schedule to make these practices sustainable in the long term.
Take time to plan some self-care activities including exercise, fun and time with loved ones. Plan time out each week and longer breaks over the course of the year and set boundaries to ensure that your workload does not become overwhelming.
To learn more about TEN visit https://www.blackdoginstitute.org.au/the-essential-network/
ED: Dr Melissa Black is a clinical psychologist and clinical research fellow at the Black Dog Institute.