Journal Article

A workplace Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) intervention for improving healthcare staff psychological distress: A randomised controlled trial

Prudenzi, Arianna, Day, Fiona, O’Connor, Daryl B., Graham, Christopher D., Flaxman, Paul E., Wilding, Sarah

2022

Overview

The levels of psychological distress and burnout among healthcare staff are high, with negative implications for patient care. A growing body of evidence indicates that workplace programmes based on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) are effective for improving employees’ general psychological health. However, there is a paucity of research examining the specific psychological and/or behavioural processes through which workplace ACT programmes transmit their beneficial effects. The aim of this randomised controlled trial was to investigate the outcomes and putative processes of change in a 4-session ACT training programme designed to reduce psychological distress among healthcare staff (n = 98). Ninety-eight employees of a healthcare organisation were randomly allocated to the ACT intervention or to a waiting list control group. Study measures were administered on four occasions (baseline, mid-intervention, post-intervention, and follow-up) over a three-month evaluation period. Results showed that the ACT intervention led to a significant decrease in symptoms of psychological distress and a less pronounced reduction in burnout. These effects were mediated primarily via an improvement in mindfulness skills and values-based behaviour and moderated by participants’ initial levels of distress. At four-week post-intervention, 48% of participants who received the ACT intervention showed reliable improvements in psychological distress, with just under half of the aforementioned improvements (46.15%) meeting criteria for clinically significant change. The results advance ACT as an effective stress management intervention for healthcare staff. The findings should be confirmed in a large scale randomised controlled trial with longer follow-up and cost-effectiveness analyses.

• Publisher: Public Library of Science,Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subject: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy / Biology and Life Sciences / Burn out (Psychology) / Burnout / Burnout, Professional - prevention & control / Care and treatment / Cognition & reasoning / Complications and side effects / Cost analysis / Delivery of Health Care / Effective stress / Employees / Flexibility / Funding / Health aspects / Health care / Humans / Intervention / Medical personnel / Medicine and Health Sciences / Mental health / Mindfulness / Occupational health / Occupational stress / Patient outcomes / Patient safety / Psychological aspects / Psychological Distress / Psychological stress / Psychology / Self help / Social Sciences / Stress / Stress (Psychology) / Supervision / Workplace