Almost half of ICU staff experiencing post-Covid trauma

Liaison Workforce

A report from King’s College London has shown alarming rates of trauma amongst hospital staff in the aftermath of the first wave of COVID-19.

Whilst just over half of the 709 staff asked reported good wellbeing, nearly half reported symptoms of severe anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder or problem drinking.

The researchers used an anonymous web survey to question staff from across nine intensive care units across England during June and July of last year, finding that nursing staff were more likely to report feelings of distress than doctors or other clinical staff.

This shows the absolute necessity for NHS management teams to focus on wellbeing programmes as we head into 2021, in order to support teams in the recovery of COVID-19 and to hopefully avoid greater problems within the workforce as staff reach burnout and mental health issues.

Liaison Workforce Managing Director, Judith Shaw, says: “COVID-19 continues to have a massive impact on the NHS, and as such, the response to support our NHS workforces should be equally as unprecedented. Gaps in the workforce already exist, and will expand if the wellbeing of existing teams is not treated as a priority.

“There are a number of things that can be done centrally to make improvements, from enabling flexible working through the effective use of banks and collaborative banks, to using analytics to identify and act on areas of concern. Liaison Workforce is committed to supporting NHS organisations to apply the tools which will improve their workforce planning and optimisation, especially where it has an ultimate benefit to the wellbeing of our valued NHS staff.”

To find out more or discuss your Trust’s workforce needs, please contact us.