While support for NHS leaders is essential to creating a psychologically safe culture for nurses, safe staffing must also be mandated, a senior nurse and health policy expert has said. .
Dame Anne-Marie Rafferty, former President of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) and Professor of Nursing Policy at King’s College London, spoke at an event attended by the country’s leading health authorities, in which nurses and other health staff He said moral injury among people is driving people out of hospitals. Profession.
“But this nettle needs to figure out the funding.”
Anne Marie Lafferty
He said policymakers should “get a firm grip” on workforce funding, set minimum staffing levels and encourage leaders to better address the concerns of nurses, doctors and other medical staff. He said it was necessary to support the
Dame Anne Marie made the comments during a panel discussion on repairing the NHS’s “broken” culture at the Times Health Board Summit 2024 in London earlier this week.
This panel focused on ways to improve transparency, reduce a culture of “defensiveness” when complaints are received, and ultimately improve learning and patient care.
Also participating in the panel were Dr. Waheed Arian, The Times’ Doctor of the Year and an Afghan refugee, and James Ticomb, Chief Executive of Patient Safety Watch.
Dame Anne-Marie said cultural improvements would only be possible if “fundamental” workforce issues were resolved.
“According to a staff survey, almost 70% [of clinicians] They say they don’t have enough staff to do the job properly,” Dame Anne Marie said.
“This has a series of cultural implications for patients and staff. For patients, it means lack of care, lower quality of care, and longer wait times.
“This has meant record levels of depression, anxiety, burnout and, more recently, psychological damage for staff in the service, who are wracked with guilt of not being able to actually do the job they were trained to do. It is.”
Dame Anne-Marie said mental injury was “driving people out of the profession”, citing the situation in the health service as a heart patient as an example.
“What would we do if this was one? We’re going to try to stabilize the condition immediately before it worsens further,” she said, adding that doing this would require setting minimum staffing levels. He added that it means to.
She continued: “Young women, [in the health service] particularly at risk [of mental health problems]this is really bad news for young nurses.
“It’s completely ridiculous and absurd that we’re doing this.” [minimum staffing] Caring for and raising a dog takes a toll, but a loved one doesn’t. That needs to change. ”
Dr. Ariane said that, like Anne-Marie, he and other medical staff had experienced psychological harm as a result of working to the limits of the workforce.
Titcomb spoke at the event about his experiences on the other side that inspired him to become a patient safety advocate.
He described a defensive culture of denial among midwives after his newborn son died because signs of sepsis were missed and his and his wife’s concerns ignored.
Titcomb agreed that fixing this closed culture requires cultivating psychological safety.
Anne Marie Lafferty attends Times Health Board Summit
Dame Anne-Marie said one way to do that is to support leaders. She said: “The majority of staff are not confident that their line managers can act on their concerns.
“It’s a leadership issue. More basic support for line managers and supervisors, because it’s the whole chain of command that’s looking after the staff that needs it.
“[If] They can’t make changes because they don’t have the resources.
“You can have all the organizational and cultural policies in place, but if they’re not working properly, [manager] There is no benefit to patients at the level of contact with staff. ”
She went on to say that the culture of fear among clinicians is shared by leaders and managers, saying, “Florence Nightingale had a saying: ‘Fear is the enemy of progress.’
“Most of what we’re talking about is the nature of this embedded fear.”
The Times event coincided with the publication of the committee’s report on health and social care, and was attended by Victoria Atkins, the health and social care secretary, Tom Keith-Roach, AstraZeneca UK chief executive, and Britain’s former chief scientific adviser, among others. , and other prominent guest speakers also appeared. Sir Patrick Vallance.
The event focused on discussion of the commission’s report’s 10 recommendations for the future government after the expected general elections in 2024.
These recommendations included broad reforms to Social Security, refocusing health services on preventive care and public health, and eliminating student loans for health care workers.
Dozens of other top nurses, doctors, NHS chiefs, educators, leading health figures and representatives from the pharmaceutical and private healthcare sectors were also in attendance.
Professor David Green, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Worcester, asked the committee to discuss a long-term workforce plan for the NHS as a way to improve the issues the committee has been discussing.
Professor Green expressed concern that the increase in training places has lagged behind the ambitious targets set out in the plan.
Dame Anne-Marie responded that funding the scheme was a “fundamental” issue.
she said: Before 2010, the NHS was very good at converting surplus resources into increased staff numbers and reduced waste.
“We have since dealt with the shock of austerity and the pandemic. [which] our recovery was much slower [from] than its European neighbors.
“But this nettle needs to figure out about funding. A letter of recommendation is not enough. We need to build hope and let people know that the cavalry is coming soon.”