The benefits of mindfulness in mental healthcare professionals

Background: Burnout is a widely reported syndrome consisting of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and a lowered sense of accomplishment. Mindfulness practices have been shown to be useful in lowering distress and burnout in clinical and non-clinical cohorts. Our aim was to explore the potential personal and occupational benefits of a structured mindfulness intervention on a cohort of mental health professionals. A mixed-methods approach was utilised in order to enhance the exploratory power of the study. Methods: We conducted a pilot study involving healthcare practitioners employed at a community outpatient mental health clinic. As a pilot, we relied on a single group and implemented a quasi-experimental, simultaneous mixed methods design by incorporating both quantitative pre- and post- testing alongside written qualitative post-test responses. Results: Analysis of the data demonstrated a significant difference between overall mindfulness when comparing post-test (mean=140.8, standard deviation=18.9) with pre-test data (mean=128.3, standard deviation=28.6). Participants also showed a statistically significant difference in three of the subscales: observation, describing, and non-reactivity. A moderate effect size was seen for each of the above differences.  Analysis of the qualitative data revealed a range of potential themes which may be used to explain the differences exhibited across participants' personal and professional lives, which can be grouped into two thematic overarching groups: emotional reactivity and listening/communicating.  Conclusions: The results of this pilot study indicate that a structured, six-week mindfulness program has the potential to benefit clinicians, personally by reducing emotional reactivity and professionally by promoting deep listening and communication.