Mantra meditation programme for emergency department staff: a qualitative study.

Emergency department staff described high work pressure and perceived stress, but those who attended a mantra meditation programme reported benefits including increased attention and awareness, improved emotion regulation, new coping mechanisms, relaxation, and better sleep. Conflicting attitudes and barriers such as scheduling, practice length, and individual differences also emerged. Staff voiced a need for a workplace well-being programme. The findings suggest mantra meditation might be a viable tool to improve attention, emotion regulation, and stress coping, potentially impacting workplace well-being, patient safety, and care quality. Organizational support was seen as integral to embedding such a programme.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Rates of burnout and stress in healthcare practitioners are steadily increasing. Emergency department (ED) staff are particularly susceptible to such poor outcomes. Mantra meditation (MM) may contribute to increased well-being. The primary aim of this study was to obtain indepth qualitative feedback on ED staff's experience of a MM programme. A secondary objective was to harness staff's perception of the ED working environment. Qualitative study. ED in St James' Hospital, Dublin, Ireland. Doctors, nurses, allied health professionals and administrative staff (n=10, eight women, mean age 35.6 years) working in the ED who attended a MM programme. Semistructured interviews were conducted by a trained independent researcher. Interviews were transcribed and thematically analysed. Five main themes and six subthemes were identified: work pressure and perceived stress; perceived benefits of meditation (with subthemes of increased attention/awareness, improved emotion regulation and new coping mechanisms, relaxation and sleep quality); conflicting attitudes to practice; barriers to meditation practice (with subthemes of schedule, length of practice and individual differences); and facilitators to practice. ED staff in this study described the demands of their work and voiced a need for a workplace well-being programme. Our findings suggest that MM might represent a viable tool to develop attention and awareness, improve emotion regulation and improve their capacity to cope with stress, which may impact their workplace well-being, wider health service, patient safety and quality of care. Support from the organisation is considered to be integral to embedding of a workplace well-being programme, such as the practice of meditation into their daily lives.