How Healthcare Professionals Can Embrace Wellness

The healthcare industry is one of the most stressful industries to work in, and many healthcare professionals can find themselves feeling burnout after only a few years in the job.

This isn’t something that many like to speak about.

For professionals who went into a career specifically to help people and improve health, doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals are notoriously bad at getting help for their own issues.

Taking Care of Mental Wellbeing

Being a fly on the wall of any doctor’s office or hospital cubicle on any given day will give you an insight into just hope many times the medical professional speaks to their patients about the need to avoid stress and be mindful, but why aren’t they following their own advice?

It can be very hard to recognize mental health issues before they get on top of you, and even harder for people who have dedicated their careers to be the strong person who is looking after other people’s health to notice they have a problem and do something about it.

Here are six ways that every medical and healthcare professional can embrace wellness into their lives for a happier and healthier work-life balance.                     

Working in the Best Environments Possible

Before even considering doing anything else on this list, you must make sure you are working in the best environment possible for you.

What this means is feeling safe and happy both in your working facility and in the wider area of where you’re living and existing. Take a look at these amazing places for nurses to work and for doctors to work throughout the country, and being in the fight palace can have a huge boost for your mental health and wellness.

Take a step back and examine your life right now, are you really happy where you are? If not, it might be time to pack up and move!

Avoiding Burnout from Stress

Wouldn’t life be so much easier if we just decided to avoid stress altogether? It would be lovely, but sadly avoiding stress is not something we have much control over.

What we do have control over, however, is how to deal with stress when it happens.

There are, broadly, two types of stress: chronic stress and acute stress. Acute stress is a situation that happens suddenly and ends suddenly, such as a bereavement or an emergency; chronic stress is the stress that builds over time and usually gets worse.

It’s practically impossible to avoid acute stress, but the more you try to deal with smaller situations and talk them through as they arise, the less chance you have of being afflicted with chronic stress and becoming burnt out.

Talking Through Mental Health Issues

Is stress getting to you? Something else bothering you? It’s good to talk, and you will be telling your patients every day that talking through issues is much better for them, so it’s time you took your own advice.

All healthcare professionals need time to let off some steam, but as healthcare gets more stressful, more facilities are offering mental health services to employees, and it’s a good idea to take them up.

You may even be sitting opposite another healthcare professional who can help you out, mental health nurses!

Taking the Time to Be Mindful

What is being mindful of? Being mindful is about living life at the moment and appreciating the things that you have in the here and now.

People who regularly practice mindfulness exercises such as gratitude journals and meditation often report feelings of deep calmness and the ability to deal with and overcome stressful situations a lot easier.

Being mindful is a great way to keep yourself grounded in a tough career and a good way to remind yourself that while a stressful situation is happening right now, it won’t be happening all of the time, and whatever impact it is having now can be faced and dealt with.

Embracing Meditation

More and more medical professionals are recommending meditation, so why aren’t you taking up their advice?

Meditation has a huge number of health benefits from helping you sleep better, lowering the blood pressure (and pressure on the heart), and there’s even evidence to suggest that meditation can help build a stronger immune system and prevent you from getting sick quite as often a really important benefit for anyone working in healthcare!

Practicing meditation daily can be tough for people with a hectic schedule, but these are exactly the type of people who will benefit from meditation the best. Grab a free app and set aside 20 minutes a day to get meditating and see what a positive impact it will have on your life in just a few short weeks.

Once you’ve got into the habit of meditating, you’ll find it hard to stop, and you’ll become an evangelical supporter who is likely to share their new discovery with your patients more readily!

Taking Time Off

There’s an ancient proverb that says, “a change is as good as a rest," but, in some cases, rest is what’s actually needed, and a change just won’t cut it.

Taking time off from your busy job in healthcare is absolutely vital so that you can rest and recuperate, recharge and come back stronger.

In every healthcare job, you’ll get a certain amount of holiday time; it’s critical that you take this holiday time and learn to embrace your time off so that you can come back as a stronger and more settled individual.

Trying to work all of the hours under the sun and work hard for everyone else will take its toll eventually, and thievery best healthcare professionals in both doctoring ad nursing understand that taking your vacation days and spending them somewhere away from work is an important thing to do to help you to better deal with your stressful job.

So, a book that holiday to the Bahamas, crack open a coconut, and lay in a hammock for two weeks in the sunshine; you’ve earned it!