One of UK’s largest teaching trusts backs Nursing Times campaign

The trust signed up to support the campaign, after its chief nurse, Sam Foster, responded to a call made by Nursing Times to NHS providers across the UK.

“The response of our teams during this exceptionally challenging period has been extraordinary”

Sam Foster

Oxford University Hospitals, one of the largest NHS teaching trusts, employs over 14,000 staff, including 4,378 nurses and midwives, and 1,521 healthcare assistants and clinical support staff.

It runs four hospitals – the John Radcliffe Hospital, the Churchill Hospital and the Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre, all in Oxford, and the Horton General Hospital in Banbury, north Oxfordshire.

The trust, which became a foundation trust on 1 October 2015, is also working towards achieving Magnet status, a global accreditation scheme for high quality standards for nursing and midwifery.

The provider highlighted its Growing Stronger Together – Rest, Reflect, Recover programme designed to look after the wellbeing of its staff and enable recovery during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The aims of the programme include meeting the immediate need for workforce rest and recovery, enhanced support and building working lives that have more flexibility and autonomy.

As part of it, the trust said it expected each member of its staff to have a ‘wellbeing check-in’ and at least one follow-up meeting with their line manager or a nominated other individual by March 2022.

It has also created an online guide to health and wellness, focusing on the six areas – emotional and psychological, environmental, financial, occupational and intellectual, physical, and social.

Nursing Times launched the Covid-19: Are You OK? campaign in April 2020 to first raise awareness of the mental health pressures and wellbeing needs of nurses during and after the coronavirus pandemic.

We are now in the second phase of the campaign, which involves actively asking employers from the health and care sector to back the aims of the campaign.

“As we move the future, ensuring the wellbeing of our staff is an absolute top priority for our trust”

Sam Foster

As a result, we aim to contact the majority of NHS acute, specialist, community and mental health providers, as well as independents, in the coming weeks to see if they will sign the campaign pledge.

In signing up to support the campaign, employers are pledging to provide easily accessible formal mental health and wellbeing support to staff for as long as it is needed.

They are also agreeing to foster a culture of mutual support, in which staff are alert to the possibility that colleagues may be experiencing problems as a result of their work during the pandemic.

In addition, they are pledging to ensure staff experiencing problems know they will receive a positive, supportive response by disclosing them and that it will not be viewed as a sign of weakness.

Thank you to Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust for becoming the latest NHS provider to sign up to the Covid-19: Are You OK? campaign pledge.

• Read the trust’s full pledge on the Nursing Times website
• Read the pledge on the foundation trust’s own website

Sam Foster, chief nursing officer at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, said: “The response of our teams during this exceptionally challenging period has been extraordinary.

“As we move the future, ensuring the wellbeing of our staff is an absolute top priority for our trust, and we will go above and beyond to care for them, so that they can continue to provide the best possible care for our patients.”

In October 2020, specialist health service provider, The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre NHS Foundation Trust, became the first UK employer to sign the pledge to support the principles of the Covid-19: Are You OK campaign.

A Nursing Times survey of 3,500 nurses undertaken for the campaign’s launch found that 33% of respondents rated their overall mental health and wellbeing as “bad” or “very bad” and 50% described themselves as “a lot” more anxious or stressed since the pandemic.

Sam Foster

The mental health of clinicians during the pandemic has also been the subject of reports and surveys involving the King’s Fund, the Laura Hyde Foundation, the British Medical Association and others.

Meanwhile, findings from research is increasingly being published on the lack of support available to staff during the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic.

The most recent are concerning findings from a University College London study, which explored what psychological support in place for health and care staff during the first peak, as well as what was needed going forwards.

• Click here to read about our Covid-19: Are You OK? campaign