“I quit!” – Three quarters of NHS Staff consider leaving health service, survey says.

Research by the Healthcare Workers Foundations (HWF) have discovered staff were increasingly concerned about their mental health and wellbeing. Having gone through one of the busiest periods in seven-decades due to the COVID-19 pandemic, stress levels have piled up throughout all staff levels and things aren’t getting any easier going into cold and flu season.

Medics working long hours are set to face another long, difficult winter as flue season approaches and a record amount of patients await surgery and treatments. Due to rising pressures, staff have commented on wanting to leave the health service in the last 12 months, whilst over half of staff have said they “do not have access to workplace wellbeing initiatives or staff rooms were considering quitting in the next year.”

Job satisfaction is paramount to maintain a health work life. The HWF survey revealed that out of 1,112 people quizzed, nearly half of respondents would not recommend the NHS as an employer whilst 69 percent said they felt pressured to work whilst feeling unwell. The chair of the HWF, Dominic Pimenta, has said “these findings will come as no surprise to anyone who has ever worked in the NHS, but we hope facilitating communication about this vital topic between the public and trusts will enable everyone to realise we are still not meeting the basic needs of our healthcare workers.”

The NHS plays a vital part in maintaining the publics health and looking after those that need it most, but it is also important that they too, are looked after. More needs to be done to ensure the feeling that our healthcare workers are proud to do their jobs.

To read more, click here: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/healthcare-workers-survey-nhs-staff-quitting-b1934795.html