"Everyone is just trying to make it to the end of the shift": Neuropsychology review of staff experiences in acute stroke services at NHNN

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Effective multidisciplinary team working enhances patient care and staff performance and reduces length of stay. In stroke services, this has recently been strained by challenges of staff shortages, team exhaustion and COVID-19, in addition to SSNAP data reporting responsibilities. Consequently, psychological distress has heightened in these healthcare workers. Understanding staff experiences in stroke team environments is crucial to staff retention, wellbeing, and reshaping effective multidisciplinary processes. Method(s) Clinical staff in emergency, hyperacute, and acute stroke units at our hospital were invited in May 2022 to complete an online questionnaire based on validated measures of teamwork, stress, and burnout. Result(s) Twenty-seven respondents represented across therapy, medical (29.6%), and nursing (29.6%) teams. Teamworking was rated as positive by most staff (63%), relating this to open communication and diverse, specialised stroke knowledge. Over 75% of the sample experienced moderate to high burnout, with prevalent experiences of emotional exhaustion. External pressures to meet SSNAP requirements was a time resource barrier that lowered sense of both personal achievement and input into directing work duties. Stress was in the severe-dangerous range for 37% of respondents. Key themes identified for improvement were opportunities for education and service development, and efficiency of knowledge sharing. Conclusion(s) Our multidisciplinary stroke teams reported high levels of stress and burnout, associated with challenging staff to patient ratios, and feeling professional autonomy is compromised to meet stroke service standards. Positive experiences of teamworking were viewed as partially protective against further distress escalations. Results highlight the critical need for novel implementations focusing on team support and development.