Moral Injury in Healthcare Providers: What Clinicians and Hospital Leadership Can Do-View Presentation

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Video Summary

The presentation at the APA conference focused on the concept of moral injury among healthcare providers, especially heightened during the COVID-19 pandemic. Steve Cuff, alongside Drs. Lourdes Dale and David Chessire from the University of Florida College of Medicine Jacksonville, explored the implications of moral injury and burnout on healthcare professionals. They discussed the psychological stressors stemming from working conditions where practitioners find themselves unable to provide optimal care due to systemic constraints, leading to a sense of ethical or moral violation.<br /><br />The session included research findings indicating high rates of moral injury and burnout among healthcare workers. The research highlighted several predictors of these issues, including lack of leadership support and personal experiences of moral distress. Dr. Chessire shared practical interventions focusing on enhancing leadership support and creating institutional structures for psychological support, such as the CHAMP program, which provides free mental health services to healthcare workers.<br /><br />The discussion underscored the need for systemic changes to address these psychological impacts effectively and emphasized the role of leadership in mitigating moral injury by promoting transparent communication, empathy, and inclusion in decision-making processes. Additionally, the need for standardizing how moral injury is understood and addressed in clinical settings was emphasized, potentially through inclusion in diagnostic manuals to facilitate further research and systematic support mechanisms.

Keywords

moral injury

healthcare providers

COVID-19 pandemic

burnout

psychological stressors

systemic constraints

ethical violation

leadership support

moral distress

CHAMP program

mental health services

systemic changes

diagnostic manuals