Impact Wellbeing™ Guide

At a glance

Explore NIOSH's Impact Wellbeing Guide for a step-by-step systems approach to improving wellbeing and building trust between leaders and healthcare workers.

Overview

Improving professional wellbeing for all healthcare workers is key to the success of hospitals and healthcare systems. Benefits range from boosting staff morale to ensuring a safe and supportive work environment for both healthcare workers and patients.

To help hospital leaders make meaningful changes to improve professional wellbeing, NIOSH and the Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes' Foundation designed the Impact Wellbeing Guide: Taking Action to Improve Healthcare Worker Wellbeing. The Guide is designed to help hospital leaders and executives accelerate or supplement professional wellbeing work in their hospitals at the operational level.

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Use the link below to download the Impact Wellbeing Guide.

Read the full Guide‎

Download the Impact Wellbeing Guide: Taking Action to Improve Healthcare Worker Wellbeing
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What's included

The Guide includes six evidence-informed Actions designed to improve the professional wellbeing of healthcare workers and strengthen hospital operations. Each Action offers useful background information and tools to fully equip hospital leaders to complete all steps. The activities culminate in a long-term wellbeing plan so that your team can sustain efforts over time.

Graphic showing six sequential steps labeled Actions one through six.
The Impact Wellbeing Guide has tools and resources for each Action.

Evidence-Informed and Real-World Tested‎

The Impact Wellbeing Guide builds upon existing research and resources, as well as NIOSH's 50 years of occupational safety and health expertise. The Guide was real-world tested for usability by hospital leaders from six hospitals within the CommonSpirit Health system across the United States. Additionally, it was informed by conversations with nearly two dozen organizations, including professional organizations, academic institutions, unions, and federal agencies.

Key principles of the Impact Wellbeing Guide

Use a systems approach - Go beyond encouraging self-care and individual resilience to focus on operational-level improvements.

Build trust - Prioritize two-way communication to create transparency and involve staff in decisions around wellbeing efforts.

Explore the Guide's six actions

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Action 1: Review Your Hospital's Operations
Conduct a review of your hospital's operations to determine how they support professional wellbeing.
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Action 2: Build Your Professional Wellbeing Team
Build a dedicated team to support professional wellbeing at your hospital.
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Action 3: Break Down Barriers for Help-Seeking
Break down barriers for help-seeking by updating credentialing application questions.
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Action 4: Communicate Your Commitment to Professional Wellbeing
Develop a suite of communication tools that help you share updates with your workforce.
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Action 5: Integrate Professional Wellbeing into Quality Improvement
Use the quadruple aim quality improvement framework to integrate professional wellbeing.
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Action 6: Develop Your Long-Term Professional Wellbeing Plan
Create a 12-month plan to continue to move your professional wellbeing work forward.

Workshop series: Delving deeper into the Actions

NIOSH hosted a three-part virtual workshop series to further explore the Guide’s resources. Participants learned how to make systems-level changes within their hospitals and build trust between leaders and healthcare workers. They also got to hear examples of the Actions in practice from wellbeing experts and hospital leader peers. Each workshop covered two of the six Actions in the Guide.

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The recordings of all three sessions are available on YouTube.

Watch the Workshops‎

Each session dives deeper into the Guide and how hospital leaders can accelerate professional wellbeing efforts no matter where their hospital is in its journey.
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Content Source:
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health