While there are many significant problems people today are facing due to coronavirus—such as unemployment, business failure, and social isolation, to name a few—there is one problem that not many people consider when it comes to fighting against the virus: the mental health of medical workers.
Medical workers are humans just like everyone else, and constantly battling the virus for weeks and months at a time will certainly take a toll. Anything can eat up their mental well-being, from the lack of supplies for treating patients to the increase in confirmed cases that never seem to slow down.
If you are running a medical institution, you must be aware of your medical worker’s mental health. While tracking this can be quite a challenge in and of itself, some things can be done to address this problem.
Tackling the deteriorating mental health of medical workers fighting COVID-19
One practice that multiple health institutions have already implemented is offering to post a psychiatric workforce, not to tackle the virus directly, but to act as assistants to the frontline medical workers. That way, when more frontline workers need help with anything mental health-related, these psychiatrists can offer the necessary services and measures to ease their minds. For example, they can prescribe medication to ease the mind, or offer hotlines to be contacted for any mental support.
Other than having a workforce aimed directly to assist frontline medical workers with mental health issues, there are many other implementations to be considered. For example, frequent reminders to the health workers to take breaks, as well as advising them to avoid frequently checking news and social media. These tips can significantly reduce the stress they experience. Also, regularly offering healthy meals can fuel the body and provide the brain with all the necessities to function efficiently. Finally, you must create an environment that welcomes open conversation, where frontline medical workers are encouraged to speak about how they feel, easing their minds.
That said, perhaps the one thing you need to implement to help your frontline medical workers with their mental state is to be the leader they need you to be. With troubling times such as these, your workers will look for someone to look up to for direction amidst the chaos. When they see that you are up there working your soul out trying to care for the people around you, they will feel motivated to do the same. At the same time, knowing that they share the same burden as you will help them feel like they are part of a team fighting for the same goal, rather than a team member left alone to carry the burden.
Conclusion
Put simply, your workforce’s mental state will be the difference between successfully treating the patients that arrive at your hospital and not providing the right quality service to save lives. As such, always put the well-being of frontline medical workers as a top priority, to ensure that their needs are served, thus allowing them to better serve the needs of their patients.
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