New Peer Support Program Launches at Duke

A new program launched this summer from the Center fulfilling a long time need at Duke. The Peer Support program was developed by Administrative Director, Melissa Segal and is now led by her and McLean Pollock; Director of the PiCASO Peer Coaching Programs and Assistant Professor for the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences.

The Duke Peer Support Program trains volunteer colleagues to support their peers. Peer Support Volunteers (PSV’s) listen, help their peers process their experiences, and identify appropriate resources as needed. Duke Health team members can take the 2-hour training and gain approval from their supervisor to begin the process of becoming a PSV.

When employees are facing stressors in their personal or professional life, they can chat confidentially with a colleague and seek appropriate resources. Duke employees can access peer support by visiting hsq.dukehealth.org/psv.

Learn more about the peer support program or become a volunteer here.

New Article: The Science of Health Care Worker Burnout

The Center’s own Drs. Rehder, Adair, and Sexton published “The Science of Health Care Worker Burnout” in the Archives of Pathology just last week. Health care worker well-being has been the leading concern in medicine given the severity and robust links to outcomes such as medical error, mortality, and turnover.

There is a continued need to help health care workers. In the article, they summarize the early intervention strategies and point toward future research to evaluate these interventions using standardized metrics.

Read the full article here.

Well-Being Ambassador Training goes Virtual

The Duke Center for Healthcare Safety and Quality is excited to officially launch our new virtual 10-week Well-being Ambassador Training. Led by experts, Dr. Bryan Sexton and Dr. Carrie Adair, healthcare workers can learn about the science and practice of well-being for themselves and others, for only one hour a week!

Pandemic exhaustion is severe but treatable! Compared to
anxiety and depression, burnout is relatively easy to treat using
bite sized strategies. These strategies can enhance your well-being, and through sharing, the well-being of your co-workers.

The virtual training begins September 21st and runs until November 23rd. Up to 10 hours of CEU/ANCC credit will be available

To enroll or learn more, visit our Resilience & Well-being page.

WISER to the Rescue! Reduction in Healthcare Worker Burnout and Improvement in Well-being

The Center’s very own Dr. Carrie Adar, Dr. Bryan Sexton, and their colleagues published a new article, Randomized controlled trial of the “WISER” intervention to reduce heatlhcare worker burnout, in the Journal of Perinatology on Monday.

The WISER (Web-based Implementation for the Science of Enhancing Resilience) intervention is made up of six guided well-being modules based on learning principles which combine educational material with practice-based learning. These modules are feasible and practical with most completing in under 20 minutes.

WISER was implemented to reduce healthcare worker burnout and after this randomized controlled trial, WISER appeared to do just that.

Read the article about how WISER improved healthcare worker well-being here.

Well-Being Featured in Greater Good Science Magazine & The Joint Commission

 

This week, HSQ was featured in two articles from The Greater Good Science Center at the University of California, Berkeley and The Joint Commission.

Dr. Carrie Adair was quoted in Greater Good Science Magazine’s article Can Practicing Gratitude Boost Nurses’ Resilience?, highlighting the importance of gratitude through well-being tools such as writing a gratitude letter or three good things. Adair’s 2019 study with Dr. Bryan Sexton (Duke) and Dr. Lindsay Kennedy (Hendrix College) found that using these tools provided promising interventions in healthcare worker burnout. Read Three Good Tools: Positively reflecting backwards and forwards is associated with robust improvements in well-being across three distinct interventions. To enroll in a tool, visit our Well-being Tools page.

On Wednesday, The Joint Commission highlighted in their blog Dr. Sexton and Dr. Adair’s publication Perceptions of Institutional Support for “Second Victims” Are Associated with Safety Culture and Workforce Well-Being. Their research reminds us that second victim support is an unmet need, but when we offer that support, second victims report an improved well-being.