Interventions geared toward reducing work-related stress for individual healthcare staff may result in improvements in how people deal with stress as much as a yr later. Findings from a Cochrane review of the newest available evidence construct on the conclusions of a previous review in 2015 that found low-quality evidence that interventions, akin to cognitive behavioral training (CBT), mental and physical rest, were higher than none.

The researchers included 117 studies of the consequences of various interventions on stress alleviation in the present review, of which 89 studies were latest. These 89 studies were published between 2013 and 2022. A complete of 11,119 healthcare staff worldwide were randomized to different interventions, and stress was assessed by questionnaires measuring stress symptoms within the short term (up to 3 months after an intervention ended), within the medium term (between three and 12 months) and long-term (follow-up after greater than a yr).

The review from Cochrane, a collaboration of independent, international experts, checked out interventions at the extent of the person healthcare employee that focused attention either on the experience of stress, or away from the experience of stress. Strategies for focusing attention on the stress included CBT, and training on assertiveness, coping and communication skills. Interventions that focus attention away from the stress included rest, mindfulness meditation, exercise akin to yoga and tai chi, massage, acupuncture, and listening to music. The researchers desired to see whether several types of interventions were higher than no intervention in reducing stress.

The healthcare staff within the studies were experiencing low to moderate levels of stress and burnout, which may result in physical symptoms akin to headaches, muscle tension or pain, but in addition mental symptoms, akin to depression, anxiety, impaired concentration and emotional and relationship problems.

Sietske Tamminga, assistant professor in public and occupational health at Amsterdam University Medical Centre, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, who led the research said: “Healthcare staff often take care of stressful and emotional situations in patient care, human suffering, and pressure from relationships with patients, relations and employers, in addition to high work demands and long working hours.

“We found that healthcare staff might find a way to cut back their stress by the use of individual-level interventions akin to cognitive behavior training, exercising or listening to music. This may occasionally be useful for the healthcare staff themselves and it might spill over to the patients they look after, and the organizations they work for. The effect may last for as much as a yr and a mixture of interventions could also be useful as well, not less than within the short term. Employers mustn’t hesitate to facilitate a spread of stress interventions for his or her employees. The long-term effects of stress management interventions remain unknown.”

The researchers say that larger, better-quality studies are needed to take a look at each the short- and long-term effects of individual-level interventions to be able to increase the knowledge of the evidence.

We want more studies on interventions addressing work-related risk aspects each at the person and organizational level. It is likely to be much more useful to enhance working conditions themselves, as a substitute of only helping individuals to deal higher with heavy psychosocial burdens. For instance, employers could address problems of understaffing, over-work and anti-social shift patterns. For those who’re dedicated to alter, you want to change the underlying risk aspects slightly than specializing in the symptoms.”

Dr. Sietske Tamminga, assistant professor in public and occupational health, Amsterdam University Medical Centre, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Limitations of the research include: the estimates of the consequences of individual-level stress management interventions could also be biased due to a scarcity of blinding of the participants within the included studies; many studies were small; and there have been too few studies that focused on specific aspects that could cause stress within the workplace.

Studies have reported that between 30% to 70% of physicians and nurses and 56% of anaesthesiologists experience burnout symptoms because of this of their work. Previous research has tended to deal with a specific variety of intervention in specific groups of healthcare staff. The authors of this Cochrane review write: “To the very best of our knowledge there are not any up-to-date reviews that examine the effectiveness of varied varieties of individual-level interventions geared toward reducing stress in various healthcare staff to offer a more complete overview.”

Dr Tamminga concluded: “There’s already a shortage of healthcare staff because of high turnover rates, and effective prevention of stress and burnout may help to cut back this.”

Source:

Journal reference:

Tamminga, S. J., et al. (2023). Individual-level interventions for reducing occupational stress in healthcare staff. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 2023. doi.org/10.1002/14651858.cd002892.pub6.