Excessive Workload Among Healthcare Staff

Assessment	Coursework Essay
Assessment element and code:	014
Academic Year:	2021/2022
Trimester:	2
Module Title:	Skills for Higher Education
Module Code:	MOD006960
Level:	3
Module Leader:	Michael Willshere

Introduction

Definition/scope of the essay

This essay will focus upon the issue of excessive workload amongst healthcare staff, a pressing issue that affects the wellbeing of the whole world. The issue of the excessive burden of these professionals will be analysed using several statistics, and other qualitative data to determine the root and extent of the issue. It will be discussed under four identified sub-issues with supporting evidence and their interpretation. The essay will be focused on problems and evidence that guides suggestions for improvement in this challenging situation. Further, the essay will also suggest some potential solutions to these problems.

The extent of the problem

The excessive workload of healthcare workers is a major issue faced by the health industry all over the world, making Burnout syndrome very common among healthcare professionals especially caused due to mental stress (Johnson, et al., 2020). This issue is further worsened due to the COVID-19 pandemic, increasing the workload of healthcare workers due to the increased number of daily patients due to this situation. Further, these professionals have to face the risk of contracting the corona disease which affects their mental health and ability to carry out their duties and responsibilities. All these factors contribute towards increasing the burnout faced by these workers, which have several negative consequences. For example, it leads to increased sick leave absences, high turnover rate, increased chances of psychopathy and physiological conditions, leading to an overall worsening of their mental and physical health. This problem attains a high significance because it directly affects the quality of healthcare provided by the workers to the general population. Therefore, the lives of every individual are affected by this issue and it must be dealt with efficiently and effectively.

Thesis Statement

The excess burden of work on the healthcare professionals is going to further incapacitate the healthcare quality which is seriously strained from the weight of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Main Body

This section discusses the four identified issues stemming from the problem of excessive workload among healthcare professionals.

The increased turnover rate of healthcare professionals

A survey of 43,000 nursing professionals from five countries reported that 17% to 39% of respondents planned to leave their job within a year because of the high demands of their work (Carayonand Gurses,2017). This illustrates the significant issue of the increased number of nurses quitting their jobs soon after joining, who form a significant portion of the healthcare staff. The next data reports that 47% of the nurses quote the reason for their work negatively affecting their wellbeing and health as the reason to quit their jobs, making it the most quoted reason for resignation (Statista, 2022). The second most quoted reason is the shortage of staff in the industry. This is decisive data that helps understand the effect of excessive workload on healthcare professionals.

Further, the number of doctors per 1000 people in the UK is 5.8, compared to neighbours like France having 6.5 and Italy having 8.0 (The World Bank, 2022). This is very low and illustrates the very bad condition of the health industry in the UK. The population of the UK has a growth rate of 0.57% as of 2020 (The Global Economy, 2022). It means that the population of the UK has been slowly growing through the years. However, the number of midwives and nurses per 1000 people in the United Kingdom stands at 10.3 and had been continuously decreasing from 2005 to 2018 (The World Bank, 2022). Therefore, the ratio of healthcare workers to the population of the UK is very low, especially compared to its neighbours, illustrating the huge issue of lack of capacity in the health industry.

From the above data, the extensive problem of healthcare professionals quitting their jobs is apparent with the main reason being that their workload is directly affecting their physical and mental health negatively.

Solution

This issue of global concern may be solved by decreasing the workload of the healthcare workers, to ensure that their jobs do not affect their physical or mental health. This can be achieved by recruiting more healthcare professionals by increasing hiring and spreading awareness of the need to keep a proper healthcare worker to population ratio. Further, the government may provide an incentive to the private health organisations on the condition that they maintain a good worker to population ratio in the area that they operate in. This may be achieved by conducting awareness campaigns regarding the health needs of the country, by the government. It must be followed by conduction of gratitude showing measures and other qualitative and quantitative incentives being provided to the healthcare workers, on account of their immense contribution to the country's development.

These measures will help in attracting the youth to the health industry, securing the future needs of the country regarding the health and wellbeing of the population of the UK. Further, the health organisations can be made to mandatorily include various emotional support programmes for their employees as part of their corporate social responsibility. This will enable the healthcare workers to access much needed mental and emotional support for the betterment of their general lives. It will directly translate into a better quality of services being provided by these professionals, as the mental health of healthcare workers is directly related to their performance (Azizkhani, et al., 2022).

Increased fatigue affects their performance

The high workload of healthcare professionals increases their fatigue resulting in decreased quality of services along with, worsening mental and physical health (Rajhans and Godavarthy, 2021). Further, the duty hours of these professionals are long, which often ends up making them work even after being exhausted. For example, over 50% of doctors in the UK work overtime beyond their contracted hours (Statista, 2022). This illustrates the bad working conditions of healthcare workers because they work overtime frequently. Further, NHS England staff was surveyed and it was determined that most of its workforce worked additional unpaid hours (Statista, 2022). This not only increases the emotional and physical burden of these professionals but also leads to dissatisfaction with their jobs, which is another prime reason for them to quit their jobs. Another reason is the additional workload, especially due to the pandemic situation. United Kingdom had recorded daily deaths of up to 1000 people in April 2020, during the onset of COVID-19 (GOV.UK, 2022). This illustrates the high level of pressure on these professionals since the outbreak of the corona disease.

This issue is further aggravated due to the shifting nature of the job for nurses and midwives, which involves these professionals working at different times of the day according to a roster, which may be a day, evening, or even night shift. It affects their sleeping schedule and thus, cause high levels of fatigue leading to a decrease in the quality of services that these professionals can provide to patients (Querstret, et al., 2020). This is because fatigue in the healthcare workers makes them face various disabilities, like decreased focus, headaches, muscle fatigue, and many more, which negatively affects all work done by them.

Solution

One of the biggest causes of fatigue of healthcare professionals in modern times is the COVID-19 pandemic. This is because of the constant worry and doubt regarding them contracting the disease, and their families contracting it from them (Chirico,et al., 2021). Therefore, the organisations for which they work must ensure that the safety measures to prevent these professionals from contracting the corona disease are put in place and are maintained to be effective. These measures may include proper and sufficient provision of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) kits to ensure that these workers can protect themselves against the diseases, and thus, can maintain their family's safety too.

Another reason for fatigue is the shortage of staff, making the existing workforce work more to compensate for the lack of employee force. If the workers face any difficulty or inability to cure these patients of their suffering, they feel drained of energy and causes burnout, which is termed as compassion fatigue (Azizkhani, et al., 2022). Therefore, health organisations must host various awareness campaigns to decrease the risk of compassion fatigue, which is another major issue.

Conclusion

Summary of problems and solutions

The essay dealt with the general issue of the excessive workload of healthcare workers, leading to the degradation of the quality of healthcare services provided by them. This discussion emphasised the recent and ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, causing further harm in this issue by increasing the workload and fatigue of the healthcare professionals. The essay identified two major issues named high turnover rate and increased fatigue. The solution for the high turnover rate was determined to be holding gratitude campaigns to provide the workers with satisfaction to be able to continue their jobs. Meanwhile, the solution to increased fatigue was to provide sufficient good quality PPE kits to ensure the safety of these professionals and their families

Recommendation for best practices

The recommendations proposed for improving the current scenario comprise of increasing the recruitment of healthcare professionals. To achieve this, first, there need to be encouragement and awareness campaigns that can attract the youth to the health industry. Then, the various health courses need to be redesigned to decrease the level of pressure and fatigue caused to the students, to ensure that the dropout rate remains low. This must be followed by proper division of workload among all healthcare professionals, to ensure that they do not become overburdened.

Prediction for future

Due to the current pandemic situation which will not abate anytime soon, it is expected that the recruitment of healthcare professionals will keep increasing along with various benefits to keep them in their job roles. Further, it is also expected that a lot of the workers may quit their jobs because the COVID-19 pandemic will force them to go above their capabilities. However, the next generation entering the services will be more resilient, because unlike their seniors they came into the industry knowing the pressures caused by the pandemic.

Reference List

Azizkhani, R., Heydari, F., Sadeghi, A., Ahmadi, O. and Meibody, A.A., 2022. Professional quality of life and emotional well-being among healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Iran. Frontiers in Emergency Medicine, 6(1), pp.e2-e2.

Carayon, P. and Gurses, A.P., 2017. Nursing Workload and Patient Safety—A Human Factors Engineering Perspective Chapter 30. Nursing Workload and Patient Safety—A Human Factors Engineering Perspective. Patient Saf Qual An Evidence-Based Handb Nurses, 2(1), pp.2203-16.

GOV.UK, 2022. Deaths in United Kingdom [online] Available at: <https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/deaths?areaType=overview&areaName=United%20Kingdom> [Accessed 1 March 2022]

Johnson, J., Hall, L.H., Berzins, K., Baker, J., Melling, K. and Thompson, C., 2018. Mental healthcare staff well?being and burnout: A narrative review of trends, causes, implications, and recommendations for future interventions. International journal of mental health nursing, 27(1), pp.20-32.

Querstret, D., O'Brien, K., Skene, D.J. and Maben, J., 2020. Improving fatigue risk management in healthcare: A scoping review of sleep-related/fatigue-management interventions for nurses and midwives (reprint). International journal of nursing studies, 112, p.103745.

Rajhans, P.A. and Godavarthy, P., 2021. COVID-19 Combat Fatigue among the Healthcare Workers: The Time for Retrospection and Action. Indian Journal of Critical Care Medicine: Peer-reviewed, Official Publication of Indian Society of Critical Care Medicine, 25(1), p.3.

Statista. 2022. On average, do you work unpaid beyond your contractual hours? [online] Available at: <https://www.statista.com/statistics/956813/united-kingdom-doctors-working-unpaid-overtime/> [Accessed 1 March 2022]

Statista. 2022. On average, how many additional unpaid hours do you work per week for your organization, over and above your contracted hours? [online] Available at: <https://www.statista.com/statistics/883433/nhs-england-staff-working-extra-unpaid-hours/> [Accessed 1 March 2022]

Statista. 2022. Share of nurses who plan to leave their work position in the United States as of February 2021, by reason [online] Available at: <https://www.statista.com/statistics/1253868/common-reasons-for-wanting-to-leave-work-position-among-nurses-in-the-us/> [Accessed 1 March 2022]

The Global Economy. 2022. United Kingdom: Population growth [online] Available at: <https://www.theglobaleconomy.com/United-Kingdom/population_growth/> [Accessed 1 March 2022]

The World Bank. 2022. Nurses and midwives (per 1,000 people) - United Kingdom [online] Available at: <https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.MED.NUMW.P3?locations=GB> [Accessed 1 March 2022]

The World Bank. 2022. Physicians (per 1,000 people) [online] Available at: <https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.MED.NUMW.P3?locations=GB> [Accessed 1 March 2022]