Morale and job perception of community mental health professionals in Berlin and London

Abstract

Burnout remains a problem for some, but not all, professional groups in community mental health care, and social workers in London appear to be a group with particularly low morale. Differences between professional groups depend on the location, and it remains unclear to what extent job-related and general factors impact on the morale of mental health professionals. Answers to open questions reveal general as well as specific aspects of the job perception of the professional groups, some of which may be relevant for service development, training and supervision. More conceptual and methodological work and more extensive studies are required to develop a better understanding of how community mental health professionals perceive their job and how morale may be improved.

Towards Structural Quality Indicators for Intensive Community-Based Care Programmes for Substance Abusers

“…The mentioned requirements were contentrelated (e.g., specifically trained staff, familiarity with rehabilitation), as well as personal (e.g., being open minded, having a pioneering spirit). There is an increasing belief that the character of the service provider accounts for a large part of the quality of intensive community-based care (Henskens 2004;Priebe et al 2005;Young et al 1998), and the results of this study support this.…”

“…This differs from traditional healthcare, where service providers wait until the client comes to their offices on their own initiative; in intensive community-based care, service providers are outreaching and pro-active, doing fieldwork, approaching clients unasked, and inquiring about the client. This approach raises ethical questions about client privacy (Henskens 2004;Priebe et al 2005;Young et al 1998).…”

Individual unmet needs for care: are they sensitive as outcome criterion for the effectiveness of mental health services interventions?

“…The psychiatric diagnosis was obtained through a standardised and computer-based method using operationalised criteria (OPCRIT, [18]) and psychopathology was measured by means of the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS, [11]). Measures of patients' quality of life (MANSA, [25]), treatment satisfaction (CSQ, [20]) and clinicians' job satisfaction [23] were also used. Researchers received training in all rating procedures and achieved good inter-rater reliability using videotaped interviews for PANSS (Cohen's kappa = 0.71) and case vignettes for CANSAS (Cohen's kappa = 0.90).…”

“…seems hardly linked to number or kind of interventions [6,8,15,23,29]; although with some exception, see Salize et al [24]. One out of two to four needs appears to be unmet, in particular in the areas of psychological distress, daytime activities, social contacts, and psychotic symptoms.…”

Nursing morale: what does the literature reveal?

“…As a result of low morale, these poor organisational outcomes are not only costly to the organisation but can also have serious impacts upon the health and wellbeing of staff and, as a consequence, place patients at risk of lower quality care and potentially adverse clinical outcomes. 3,10 Staff morale is a workforce phenomenon that confronts every organisation at some time. The understanding of morale is important because it can have tangible and wide-ranging effects and outcomes for an organisation.…”