International Stress Awareness Day

It's the end of a shift. You have a stinking headache and heart palpitations. You manage to get to sleep but wake up in a sweat remembering something you were supposed to do on shift. Now you can't get back to sleep as you're worrying about tomorrow. Sound familiar?

Work-related stress can manifest in many ways. Physical symptoms include palpitations, skin rashes, headaches and insomnia, and can affect cardiovascular and digestive health. As many nursing staff will testify, it also has a negative impact on mental health and can lead to anxiety and depression.

The regulators for workplace safety, the Health and Safety Executive and the Health and Safety Executive for Northern Ireland, define stress as a negative or adverse reaction to excessive pressures or other types of demands placed on them.

While not everyone will agree with this definition, it's clear that regulators expect all employers, legally and morally, to treat work-related stress as an occupational hazard and put measures in place to reduce the risk of harm to health from exposure to excessive pressure at work. This includes carrying out organisational level risk assessments – not just focusing on the individual and supporting them to manage stress, but addressing the systemic causes of work-related stress.

1 November marks the 25th anniversary of International Stress Awareness Day. It provides an opportunity for us all to check in with colleagues and, for RCN representatives, to check in with their employer to ensure that it's doing all it can to reduce the risks to both the physical and mental health of nursing staff.

If you’re a member, a manager, an RCN representative, or all three, the RCN has developed useful resources you can use to understand more about the issue. Discover what you can do to help yourself, your colleagues, and most importantly, understand what all employers should be doing to meet their moral and legal obligations under health and safety law.

As one of the major causes of stress for nursing staff is unsafe staffing, the RCN’s Workforce Standards can also help by providing a blueprint for tackling staff shortages across the UK.

There is further information and support on the RCN’s get help pages, including information on counselling for members and signposts to other resources and organisations who can support individuals.