Responding to the latest announcement on staff health and wellbeing in the NHS, Professor Jane Dacre, president of the Royal College of Physicians, welcomed the drive from NHS England to improve staff health.
She said:
Healthy staff are vital to help patients get better. As we recommended in our report on wellbeing in March, NHS Trusts will now be asked to prioritise staff wellbeing and staff engagement. We know from our own research that staff health and wellbeing in the NHS is too often seen as an optional extra - as less than two thirds of trusts (65%) have a staff health and wellbeing plan in place. 38% of NHS staff in England report having suffered work related stress and 68% of NHS staff in England report having attended work in the previous year when they did not feel well enough to perform their duties.
We also said it was vital to value the role of staff and managers, and we are delighted that Trusts will now be expected to identify a Board level director lead and senior clinician to champion this work, while providing training to all line managers to help them support their staff’s health and wellbeing.
The RCP’s own report Work and wellbeing in the NHS: why staff health matters to patient care’ launched in March this year contained 10 priorities for action for NHS Trusts, health boards and commissioners.