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Assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers

Mental health issues are a growing concern in the workplace, linked to negative outcomes including reduced productivity, increased absenteeism, and increased turnover. Employer-sponsored mental health benefits that are accessible and proactive may help address these concerns. The aim of this retrosp...

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Autores principales: Ward, Emily J., Fragala, Maren S., Birse, Charles E., Hawrilenko, Matt, Smolka, Casey, Ambwani, Geetu, Brown, Millard, Krystal, John H., Corlett, Philip R., Chekroud, Adam
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10662717/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37988363
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0294414
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author Ward, Emily J.
Fragala, Maren S.
Birse, Charles E.
Hawrilenko, Matt
Smolka, Casey
Ambwani, Geetu
Brown, Millard
Krystal, John H.
Corlett, Philip R.
Chekroud, Adam
author_facet Ward, Emily J.
Fragala, Maren S.
Birse, Charles E.
Hawrilenko, Matt
Smolka, Casey
Ambwani, Geetu
Brown, Millard
Krystal, John H.
Corlett, Philip R.
Chekroud, Adam
author_sort Ward, Emily J.
collection PubMed
description Mental health issues are a growing concern in the workplace, linked to negative outcomes including reduced productivity, increased absenteeism, and increased turnover. Employer-sponsored mental health benefits that are accessible and proactive may help address these concerns. The aim of this retrospective cohort study was to evaluate the impact of a digital mental health benefit (Spring Health) on frontline healthcare service workers’ clinical and workplace outcomes. The benefit was sponsored by a national health services company from 2021–2022 and included mental health screening, care navigation, psychotherapy and/or medication management. We hypothesized program use would be associated with improvements in depression and anxiety symptoms, and increased productivity and retention. Participants were employees enrolled in the benefit program, had at least moderate anxiety or depression, at least 1 treatment appointment, and at least 2 outcome assessments. Clinical improvement measures were PHQ-9 scale (range, 0–27) for depression and GAD-7 scale (range, 0–21) for anxiety; workplace measures were employee retention and the Sheehan Disability Scale (SDS) for functional impairment. A total of 686 participants were included. Participants using the mental health benefit had a 5.60 point (95% CI, 4.40–6.79, d = 1.28) reduction in depression and a 5.48 point (95% CI, 3.88–7.08, d = 1.64) reduction in anxiety across 6 months. 69.9% (95% CI, 61.8%–78.1%) of participants reliably improved (≥5 point change) and 84.1% (95% CI, 78.2%–90.1%) achieved reliable improvement or recovery (<10 points). Participants reported 0.70 (95% CI, 0.26–1.14) fewer workdays per week impacted by mental health issues, corresponding to $3,491 (95% CI, $1305–$5677) salary savings at approximately federal median wage ($50,000). Furthermore, employees using the benefit were retained at 1.58 (95% CI, 1.4–1.76) times the rate of those who did not. Overall, this evaluation suggests that accessible, proactive, and comprehensive mental health benefits for frontline health services workers can lead to positive clinical and workplace outcomes.
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spelling pubmed-106627172023-11-21 Assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers Ward, Emily J. Fragala, Maren S. Birse, Charles E. Hawrilenko, Matt Smolka, Casey Ambwani, Geetu Brown, Millard Krystal, John H. Corlett, Philip R. Chekroud, Adam PLoS One Research Article Mental health issues are a growing concern in the workplace, linked to negative outcomes including reduced productivity, increased absenteeism, and increased turnover. Employer-sponsored mental health benefits that are accessible and proactive may help address these concerns. The aim of this retrospective cohort study was to evaluate the impact of a digital mental health benefit (Spring Health) on frontline healthcare service workers’ clinical and workplace outcomes. The benefit was sponsored by a national health services company from 2021–2022 and included mental health screening, care navigation, psychotherapy and/or medication management. We hypothesized program use would be associated with improvements in depression and anxiety symptoms, and increased productivity and retention. Participants were employees enrolled in the benefit program, had at least moderate anxiety or depression, at least 1 treatment appointment, and at least 2 outcome assessments. Clinical improvement measures were PHQ-9 scale (range, 0–27) for depression and GAD-7 scale (range, 0–21) for anxiety; workplace measures were employee retention and the Sheehan Disability Scale (SDS) for functional impairment. A total of 686 participants were included. Participants using the mental health benefit had a 5.60 point (95% CI, 4.40–6.79, d = 1.28) reduction in depression and a 5.48 point (95% CI, 3.88–7.08, d = 1.64) reduction in anxiety across 6 months. 69.9% (95% CI, 61.8%–78.1%) of participants reliably improved (≥5 point change) and 84.1% (95% CI, 78.2%–90.1%) achieved reliable improvement or recovery (<10 points). Participants reported 0.70 (95% CI, 0.26–1.14) fewer workdays per week impacted by mental health issues, corresponding to $3,491 (95% CI, $1305–$5677) salary savings at approximately federal median wage ($50,000). Furthermore, employees using the benefit were retained at 1.58 (95% CI, 1.4–1.76) times the rate of those who did not. Overall, this evaluation suggests that accessible, proactive, and comprehensive mental health benefits for frontline health services workers can lead to positive clinical and workplace outcomes. Public Library of Science 2023-11-21 /pmc/articles/PMC10662717/ /pubmed/37988363 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0294414 Text en © 2023 Ward et al https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Ward, Emily J.
Fragala, Maren S.
Birse, Charles E.
Hawrilenko, Matt
Smolka, Casey
Ambwani, Geetu
Brown, Millard
Krystal, John H.
Corlett, Philip R.
Chekroud, Adam
Assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers
title Assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers
title_full Assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers
title_fullStr Assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers
title_full_unstemmed Assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers
title_short Assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers
title_sort assessing the impact of a comprehensive mental health program on frontline health service workers
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10662717/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37988363
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0294414
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