Pressure to cope is damaging our mental health

Nursing needs to acknowledge it’s okay not to be okay

There is growing recognition that all is not well with the mental health of the professions within the NHS.

Staff are leaving the workforce due to stress-related conditions, and tragically there are cases where individuals have taken their own lives. Can we look to those who employ us to resolve this situation or does the answer, and indeed responsibility, rest with the individual?

We have to recognise that mental health is as individual as the person who owns it. There are people who appear to thrive on stress and shrug off excessive demands, and others who find such situations so adverse that they will consider leaving the role for which they have worked so hard. The individual nature of mental health suggests that simple and blanket responses are not the best