A new study published in Nursing in Critical Care looked at building evidence-based interventions to improve staff well-being in paediatric critical care using the behaviour change wheel.
“The study aimed to explore what wellbeing means to staff who work in paediatric intensive care settings,” study author Rachel Shaw told us. “We wanted to explore what challenged their wellbeing and what might help to improve it. After that, we planned to develop interventions that would help staff to prioritize and even improve their wellbeing at work.”
The research team had some ideas of what wellbeing might look like from existing psychological theory, but they didn’t know for sure what challenges to their wellbeing would be. They also had some idea of the kinds of behavioural strategies that were more likely to be successful, based on health psychology theory, but they weren’t too sure which would work the best in a busy intensive care environment.
“I have worked with paediatric intensive care clinicians for a number of years and it was clear that their wellbeing was often challenged,” Shaw told us. “These challenges became more widely known during the pandemic, which also meant the need for intervention was more readily accepted.”
The research team conducted a feasibility pilot study to test whether it was possible to train staff to deliver the interventions and whether it was possible to run them. The researchers found that the interventions were feasible to deliver on the unit. They also found that staff did complete psychological measures using an online survey both before and immediately after attending a session. The results showed improved scores for wellbeing and depression.
“We were somewhat surprised that they did work, although we had designed the interventions based on clinicians’ lived experiences and what we know about intensive care settings,” Shaw told us. “We know it is possible to deliver low cost, low-intensity interventions in challenging clinical settings and that they could improve wellbeing.”
Shaw explained that the researchers now need to look in more detail at how these simple interventions could improve wellbeing over a more sustained period of time. Their next project is designed to collect longitudinal psychological measures to see if the initial improvement can be sustained over time.
“This is hugely important work in the context of healthcare systems which are under intense pressure with very limited financial resources,” Shaw told us. “Clinicians have been incredibly enthusiastic and our success has been largely down to individuals who have given up their own time to deliver our swell staff wellbeing interventions.”