Healthcare Issue/Stressor
- Select one current national healthcare issue/stressor to focus on.
- Reflect on the current national healthcare issue/stressor you selected and think about how this issue/stressor may be addressed in your work setting.
Healthcare issue=( Workforce injuries are much more frequent in healthcare )
Analyze , and explain how the healthcare issue/stressor above may impact your work setting.
Then, describe how your health system work setting has responded to the healthcare issue/stressor, including a description of what changes may have been implemented. Be specific and provide examples. Healthcare Issue/Stressor
APA format 250-280 words with references and in-text citations
Health care workers (HCWs) are at high risk of occupational injuries and approximately 10–15% of patients are affected by an adverse event during their hospital stay. There is scarce scientific literature about how HCWs manage these risks in practice and what support they need. This knowledge is needed to improve safety for patients and HCWs. This study explores HCWs’ experiences of workplace incidents that led to injury or posed a risk of patient and worker injury, with focus on HCWs’ emotions and actions.
Methods
This study employed a qualitative design using the critical incident technique. Semi-structured individual interviews were held with 34 HCWs from three regions in Sweden. Data were analysed using inductive category development. Healthcare Issue/Stressor
Results
Altogether 71 workplace incidents were reported. The analysis of two dimensions – the emotions HCWs feel and the actions team members and managers take when a workplace incident occurs – yielded two categories each: Anxiety during the incident, Persistent distress after the incident, Team interplay for safety actions and Support and ratification from managers and colleagues. Health care workers risked their own safety and health to provide patient safety. Teamwork and trustful relationships were critical for patient and worker safety. Support and validation from colleagues and managers were important for closure; unsatisfactory manager response and insufficient opportunities to debrief the incident could lead to persistent negative emotions. Participants described insecurity and fear, sadness over being injured at work, and shame and self-regret when the patient or themselves were injured. When the workplace had not taken the expected action, they felt anger and resignation, often turning into long-term distress. Healthcare Issue/Stressor
Conclusions
Work situations leading to injury or risk of patient and worker injury are emotionally distressing for HCWs. Team interplay may facilitate safe and dynamic practices and help HCWs overcome negative emotions. Organizational support is imperative for individual closure. For safety in health care, employers need to develop strategies for active management of risks, avoiding injuries and providing support after an injury Healthcare Issue/Stressor
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In Western countries, injury rates are higher among health care workers (HCWs) than among workers in any other field [1]. Being in patient care, HCWs are exposed to several occupational health hazards, such as viruses [2], ergonomic or physical hazards [3, 4] and physical violence [5]. Threats and violence are in fact more frequently reported in Swedish health care than in other Swedish workplaces, and the percentage of those exposed has increased in the last years [6]. All of these exposures may lead to a variety of injuries such as musculoskeletal injury, wounds, infections or psychological symptoms [7, 8]. The risk factors for occupational injury can be attributed to an interaction between characteristics of the worker and the patient, and the workplace [9, 10]. Adverse events may affect not only HCWs but also patients, and in addition may have a negative impact on relatives and health care organizations, all considered as a significant problem [11, 12]. Approximately 10–15% of patients are affected by an adverse event during their hospital stay, and a substantial part of these events are considered preventable [13, 14]. Healthcare Issue/Stressor
A few studies have explored the relationship between working conditions and both patient and HCW injuries. The findings show that a high safety climate supports safe patient care and also ensures HCW safety [15,16,17,18]. Pousette and co-authors (2017) concluded that safety improvement interventions should be planned so that both patient safety and occupational safety and health are considered concomitantly, and not separately in different processes as has been previously done in practice and research [15]. Healthcare Issue/Stressor
Qualitative study designs are used to explore the experiences of individuals, information that is difficult to obtain with quantitative methods [19]. Recent literature has highlighted that adverse events affecting the patient, the first victim, are also stressful for the HCWs involved, who are therefore commonly considered as secondary victims [20]. In a recent systematic review and meta-analysis, more than two-thirds of the affected HCWs reported troubling memories, anxiety, anger, remorse and distress [21], and elsewhere it was shown that the support received influences how the worker will feel about the error as well as the recovery process [21,22,23]. Despite the amount of literature about occupational hazards in health care, there are few studies on how HCWs experience work situations where they have been injured [24]. To the authors’ knowledge, there are no previous studies exploring HCWs’ experiences of situations at work putting them and patients at risk of injury. Healthcare Issue/Stressor
To improve safety at work and reduce harm for both patients and HCWs, it has been suggested that we should shift our focus from creating absolute safety, i.e. from the unattainable goal of zero harm, to doing a better job of actively managing risk [25]. This active management of risk requires engagement and actions at all managerial levels as well as coordinated actions between managers and frontline staff [25]. As suggested in “resilient health care” studies, safety can be described as the capacity of a system (its individuals, teams and organization) to adapt to varying conditions such as threats, hazards, possibilities and a changing work environment, so that the system succeeds in its activities and tasks [26]. In order to develop dynamic, practical strategies, we need descriptive studies that will help to identify degraded conditions and the risks they pose to patients and HCWs [25]. There is scarce scientific literature about how HCWs manage these workplace risks in practice and what support they need. This knowledge is needed to further improve the safety of patients as well as occupational safety and health for HCWs Healthcare Issue/Stressor
Also check: Analysis Of A Pertinent Healthcare Issue