Denver Health’s chief medical officer says the program is designed specifically to provide support for healthcare workers.
Denver Health has implemented the Resilience in Stressful Events (RISE) program to help increase the well-being of the health system’s health care workers, Chief Medical Officer Connie Savor Price, MD, MBA, said during the recent briefing. HealthLeaders CMO Exchange.
Stress and burnout are common in the healthcare industry. Healthcare worker burnout has reached alarming proportions during the coronavirus pandemic, a healthcare worker wellbeing expert has said. said Health leaders. Before the coronavirus pandemic, health care worker burnout rates averaged 30% to 50%, says Bernadette Melnyk, PhD, APRN-CNP, Ohio State University’s chief health officer and dean of the university’s College of Nursing. Now, the burn rate ranges from 40% to 70%, she said.
RISE was developed by Johns Hopkins Medicine specifically to help healthcare workers, Price says. “The concept of RISE is oriented towards the specific needs of health care providers and what they face in some of the difficulties of being a health care provider. Health care providers are involved in adverse patient events and medical errors, and bearing witness to them may result in emotional or even physical distress.”
RISE programming is designed to play a supportive role for health care workers, she says. “RISE is essentially a service to empathize, listen, validate and normalize. It facilitates a connection to providers and other resources if that connection is needed. It is available 24/7 and has strict confidentiality. RISE is not counseling . It’s not a problem-solving service. It doesn’t offer psychotherapy or any kind of psychiatric care. It’s a support service, with listening and links to other resources.”
Denver Health has launched seven RISE initiatives:
- RISE Line 24/7 (303-436-RISE): This telephone-based service provides 24/7 access to emotional support and psychological first aid, including a referral to welfare resources.
- RISE group support for department or team: Group support opportunities are available virtually or in person. Any manager can trigger a group support request by sending an email dhrise@dhha.org or by calling the RISE 24/7 hotline for urgent requests.
- RISE Up Staff Support Center: This is a dedicated space staffed by RISE peers that offers staff a place for self-care, reflection, emotional support and access to resources, snacks and drinks. The support center has been open seven days a week from 10:30 to 20:00
- RISE group virtual interdisciplinary support: These group support opportunities are offered on a weekly basis for various topics of concern and specific affinity groups, such as Black Affinity Group.
- Peer Assault Care Team: PACT provides immediate, confidential and voluntary support to staff following an assault in the workplace. A PACT response can be initiated by any staff member or manager by calling the RISE 24/7 hotline and requesting a PACT response on standby.
- RISE scope: RISE Peer Leaders are available to provide outreach to staff to introduce RISE services and assess needs. Peers also provide emotional support, psychological first aid, and connections to resources. Requests for establishing contact services can be made by email at dhrise@dhha.org or by calling the RISE line 24/7.
- RISE 2 You: This mobile service can be requested to come to a department or clinic. RISE peer responses and other resources are available by requesting an email visit to dhrise@dhha.org.
Stress in health care settings
There are multiple sources of stress among health care workers, Price says.
“I’m at a Level 1 trauma center and public health hospital, and our provider staff often witness distressing events. The problem with being a ‘second victim’ is that you also often feel personally responsible for the outcome. Sometimes , you think they should have been able to do more – you question whether you did everything you could have done. So there are special needs among health care providers. There are also factors that we’re seeing in the workplace like the increase in violence. There are ethical dilemmas and moral distress—there are patients who cannot access the health care they need because they do not have adequate insurance. There are tragic events—there is a lot of stress on health care teams,” she says.
At Denver Health, three dozen topics of concern were identified through RISE from July 5 to August 1 of this year, including grief and bereavement, death of patients and colleagues, physical and mental fatigue, conflict with colleagues, understaffing, isolation and loneliness and the desire to quit smoking.
Related: 4 Hot Topics at HealthLeaders Chief Medical Officer Exchange
Christopher Cheney is senior clinical care editor at HealthLeaders.
