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Orientations can avert psychosocial risks to palliative staff
Author(s) -
Kamau Caroline,
Medisauskaite Asta,
Lopes Barbara
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
psycho‐oncology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.41
H-Index - 137
eISSN - 1099-1611
pISSN - 1057-9249
DOI - 10.1002/pon.3496
Subject(s) - psychosocial , library science , sociology , citation , management , psychology , medicine , computer science , psychiatry , economics
Key points 1. Personnel in palliative care wards and hospices are at risk of chronic stress, burnout, anxiety, depression and substance/alcohol abuse because working in end-of-life care involves frequent grief, death anxiety and feelings of professional helplessness. 2. This commentary discusses the reported labour shortage in palliative care, and why some occupations are particularly at risk of quitting (e.g., care workers). 3. Most healthcare organizations are not providing palliative staff with training or orientations (inductions) about how to cope with the psychosocial risks of the profession. 4. This commentary discusses evidence that training interventions trialled on palliative staff are effective solutions. 5. The conclusion is a call on healthcare organizations to implement orientation or training programmes that help palliative personnel cope. Keywords: cancer; oncology; psychosocial risks; staff inductions; workplace coping.