The collapse of wellbeing hubs for NHS staff would be calamitous

With the future of NHS staff mental health and wellbeing hubs in limbo, a British Psychological Society chartered psychologist, who leads the service in their region, shares first-hand insight into the critical role of the hubs in supporting health and social care staff beyond the pandemic – and why it's vital the government continues to invest in them. 

The pandemic created a huge challenge for NHS staff and care services. We knew there would likely be traumatised or anxious staff who may not be able to continue to work at a time when our communities needed them the most.

Helpfully, the government responded wisely with rapid funding and deployment of NHS staff mental health and wellbeing hubs, designed to support staff through this phase.

All around the UK, NHS people and systems rallied round to create something unique to their area with the government funding they had.

Ready for burnout

We expected the worst of the mental health impact to come in the form of burnout and trauma, which usually bites in the few years following a crisis.

Indeed, across the UK, rates of burnout and associated difficulties such as low mood, insomnia, and family breakdowns continue to rise.

However, it isn't just burnout from the impact of the pandemic that is impacting staff. It's the workload and the cost of living. It's the demands of delivering the Long-Term Workforce Plan, ever growing waiting lists, and managing increasing risks in the populations we serve. It is our own physical ill health, and the wait for treatment or 'light touch' from services.

Referrals to the hubs are not decreasing, and neither is the severity of difficulties that our colleagues who come to us for help are presenting with.

Modelling meaningful prevention

The hubs meet staff as rounded individuals. We are confidential and separate from employers. Help from the hubs isn't linked to staff performance, which is why people feel safe to come to us, rather than go through their in-house employee support services.

By picking up and treating the mental health fallout from the pandemic, and the challenges facing our health and social care services, hubs are helping to keep staff at work. However, they do so much more. They've evolved from their initial purpose and are leading the way in modelling meaningful prevention; they are supporting teams of staff and health and care leaders. Some are – or were – core to their region's mass casualty and major incident plans.

We knew funding for the hubs was given on a year-by-year basis. But this year, the government decided not to extend funding, with calamitous consequences. There is nowhere to transition the work to that is safe.

Personally, I see them as having proven their worth as an integral part of system resilience.

In my experience, integrated care boards (ICBs) see their value, but don't have the funds locally. I have never witnessed such anxieties in senior leaders about the bottom line.

Staff wellbeing key to patient experience

There is a palpable sense of moral injury for hub staff at witnessing valuable psychological support for a dedicated NHS and social care workforce being withdrawn at their time of greatest need. This is a workforce that has been, and continues to, seek help from the hubs as they struggle to cope in their jobs.

We feel a moral injury at knowing the ripple effects that this will have on staffing and culture; moral injury at seeing the impact the uncertainty is having on hub staff themselves.

Sadly, now a third of the hubs are closing, or under threat of imminent closure, and staff in the hubs are worried about their own jobs. People are leaving.

The impact on me? Well, with the future of my hub undecided, I'm having to look elsewhere, and leaving the NHS is a very real option. Leaving after one of the most rewarding times of my career supporting my colleagues and the wider system to do what the NHS and care service do best: serve with compassion towards the greater good.

Let's not lose sight of what we know to be facts: staff wellbeing is the biggest predictor of patient experience and staff performance.

Organisational culture and quality of the leadership is, in turn, the biggest predictor of staff wellbeing. We need investment in those ingredients that do that, and to learn more about how to do this well.

The health and care sector needs to attract new staff who, like me, want to dedicate their working lives to what I believe is one of the UK's greatest acts of cultural compassion – the NHS.

Support the #FundNHSHubs campaign

I urge my colleagues and fellow BPS members to support our campaign to protect the NHS Staff Mental Health and Wellbeing Hubs by writing to your MP.

Together we can make a difference. 

Write to your MP