Making the mental health of nurses, midwives and healthcare assistants a top priority, by Sophia Kurz
The advent of COVID-19 has impacted the United Kingdom in ways that no one could predict. So far, the UK death toll numbers 127,000 individuals with more than 4m cases. The virus has affected not just patients and their families, but also healthcare workers. Working long hours at risk of contracting the virus, they also have to deal with the heavy stress and pressure placed to keep their COVID infected patients alive.
“Nurses are suffering the brunt of the COVID-19 pandemic. They are physically and mentally exhausted. Particularly, within critical care, there are significant levels of post-traumatic stress evident, which is extremely worrying. This is simply not sustainable,” said Nicki Credland, chair of the British Association of Critical Care Nurses.
The Nightingale Initiative for Global Healthcare Transformation (NIGHT) was founded earlier this year by Peter Arndt and Kieran Prince. It is aiming to raise funds in order to provide confidential mental health services to NHS nurses, midwives and healthcare assistants when required.
“I think we probably got one of the fastest approvals in the history of the Charity Commission,” says co-founder Peter Arndt. “We handed in the application on 20 December, two hours before they shut down for the year and we got the approval three hours after they opened up on 4th January.”
NIGHT’s ambition to help NHS workers is fuelled by the alarming number who experience mental health issues, but do not reach out. According to the charity’s website, “The annual suicide rate within nursing is nearly 25 per cent above the national average” and “85 per cent of medical practitioners have experienced problems with mental health but have never sought out treatment.”
NIGHT is a unique charity in that they aim to provide professional help to sufferers, in contrast to other mental health charities who often utilise volunteers to speak with individuals. “There are about 25 to 30 mental health charities in the United Kingdom, but they don’t have clinicians because clinicians charge to treat someone. And no charity is out there that spends several hundred pounds on each afflicted person that their charity looks after,” says Arndt.
With this ambitious goal in mind, the charity is currently trying to obtain funds and clinicians to help the many NHS workers who have borne the brunt of the pandemic in the UK.