Healthcare can be a high-stress environment to work in, so strong support structures and a culture of openness are essential. In the June 2016 edition of Nursing Management, CiC’ s client, Birmingham Children’ s Hospital’ s Sara Brown, deputy chief officer for workforce development, talks about how their work with CiC has provided the necessary help and assistance for their employees.
BCH’ s Sara Brown says: “Working with an external psychological wellbeing specialist from employee assistance programme, CiC, meant we knew we had a full service in place. Any employee can contact the telephone service for a confidential discussion with a trained counsellor. The issue is worked through in conversations, or can be triaged, with the employee being referred for off-site, face-to-face counselling. No one has to wait more than one week for an appointment and usually no more than two days.”
She adds: “We encourage a culture of openness here – it is all part of our sense of being a community. If there is a problem, we tackle it constructively. Most importantly, since the changes, the number of staff reporting work-related stress has fallen.”
Kate Nowlan, CiC’ s chief executive, comments: “The support structure we have put in place at BCH has added a level of psychological security for employees and encouraged openness among the workforce. This has had a significant positive impact for the organisation, contributing to a reduction in cases of reported employee stress, which can only be a good thing for the employees and the patients and families they care for.”
You can read this article in full here. This article was first published in Nursing Management in June 2016.