Effects of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Training on Healthcare Professionals’ Mental Health: Results from a Pilot Study Testing Its Predictive Validity in a Specialized Hospital Setting

Abstract

This pilot study aimed to evaluate the feasibility and acceptability of a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) training and to examine positive and negative symptom-focused mental health variables. The mental health variables were used to test the predictive validity of the training among healthcare professionals. Thirty healthcare professionals participated in this non-randomized pre-post intervention pilot study. The questionnaire on mental health was filled in twice. Baseline and post-intervention differences were tested with paired samples t-tests and Wilcoxon signed-rank tests. The participants’ evaluation of the training was assessed with a five-item questionnaire. The recruitment and retention were successful, and participants’ evaluation of the training itself was positive but the influence on daily life was rated only moderately positive. In comparison with baseline at post-intervention participants showed significant improvements in general mindfulness, the burnout dimension personal accomplishment, quality of sleep, positive emotions, and self-efficacy. A significant decrease was found in the burnout dimension emotional exhaustion, stress level, negative emotions at work, and worrying. No significant changes were found for the burnout dimension mental distance, and work engagement. The measures showed ample within-person differences and low, medium, or high effect sizes. The current trial approach of the MBSR training seems feasible and acceptable. Our results suggest that mindfulness, burnout, stress level, quality of sleep, positive emotions at work, negative emotions at work, self-efficacy, and worrying are meaningful mental health variables for inclusion in a larger-scale Randomized Controlled Trial on the effects of MBSR.

Group-Treatment for Dealing with the Work-Family Conflict for Healthcare Professionals

“…Strengthened occupational and family self-efficacy indicates that people feel more competent about managing competing work and family demands. Our results are consistent with other intervention research [ 66 , 68 , 97 ]. Ten Brummelhuis and Bakker [ 60 ] proposed that key resources like self-efficacy, optimism and self-esteem facilitated efficient and effective coping with contextual demands.…”

“…The results might be additionally explained by the fact that as a single-stage intervention, it may not have been significant enough to affect changes in the domains of work-life balance and the children’s health-related quality of life. Indirect support for this assertion can be drawn from the fact that previous interventions to reduce stress at the work-private interface and dysfunctional parenting consisted of a larger number of sessions [ 65 , 66 , 68 ]. Future research should investigate whether additional booster sessions may lead to more sustained health-related outcomes.…”

“…For the healthcare sector, research investigating how to improve coping with WFC is generally rare [ 67 ]. Evidence indicates that cognitive-behavioral therapy interventions and mental and physical relaxation are effective at reducing occupational stress in healthcare workers [ 68 , 69 , 70 ]. However, treatments focusing on stressors specific to WFC by taking the healthcare worker’s as well as the child’s needs into account are lacking, for example how to arrange divergent demands.…”

The Impact of Psychological Interventions with Elements of Mindfulness (PIM) on Empathy, Well-Being, and Reduction of Burnout in Physicians: A Systematic Review

“…It was described as the combination of emotional exhaustion (EE) and depersonalization (D), together with low personal accomplishment (PA) [3]. Recently, 61% of European healthcare professionals was reported experiencing work-related stress [4,5]. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the burden of burnout has become even more evident in physicians, who have been continuously facing limited resources, longer shifts, and disruptions to work-life balance, and sleep; all these factors have increased burnout [4,5].…”

A Telephone-Adapted Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program: Preliminary Effects among Healthcare Employees

“…In our study, 90% (n = 9) of the participants completed at least half of the program (≥4 sessions), which is the suggested minimal number of MBSR sessions needed to observe a change in distress [36]. Seven participants completed six or more sessions (75% of the program), which prior studies have considered a minimal number of sessions for MBSR to count as completion [37][38][39][40][41]. This percentage is also in line with rates considered as evidence of feasibility in other studies [42].…”