From journaling and dancing to quilting and painting, hospitals are offering more unorthodox activities for hospital staff and nurses to release stress and avoid burnout — all in an effort to maintain employee morale and patient safety, according to a Washington Post report.
The report highlights a variety of hospitals' strategies to help staff deal with job-related stress, particularly that for nurses.
A local nonprofit organization offered knitting classes to nurses at Alexandria, Va.-based Inova Mount Vernon Hospital last year, hoping the activity would help them cope with workday stress while also fostering teamwork. In Washington, D.C., Georgetown's Lombardi Cancer Center has an arts and humanities program that uses creativity to help patients and families, while also boosting staff morale. Artists, who are either volunteers or paid professionals, help staff manage stress and develop coping skills, and the program's director also holds journal-writing sessions.
While these activities can all help reduce caregivers' stress, Barbara Lombardo, a nurse practitioner at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland, told the Post even simple measures can add up.
"Maybe they just need to be sure to take their lunch or dinner break. Get to the lounge or get outside, take a deep breath, or do other simple things at work. Follow healthy living interventions and eat right and exercise. There are things people can do in just a few minutes to refocus on themselves," she said in the report.
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