A third of mental healthcare professionals in Malta suffer from symptoms of burnout, according to the first study of the sort.
Research carried out among inpatient professionals at Mount Carmel Hospital, the Psychiatric Unit and the Gozo psychiatric ward also shows that one out of every six participants are suffering total burnout.
Carried out by psychiatrists Patrick Barbara and Aloisia Camilleri, the study focused on five professionals, namely psychiatrists, occupational therapists, psychologists and psychotherapists, social workers and nurses.
Dr Barbara noted that burnout was a process that kicked off when an employee was faced with chronic stress at work resulting from various factors, including lack of human resources.
It starts with emotional exhaustion, especially when the job involves long working hours and challenging human cases.
This is followed by depersonalisation, where a person no longer feels attached to their job, and, finally, low personal accomplishment.
People in the caring professions, such as that of mental healthcare, could often start to doubt whether they were actually helping service users, Dr Barbara said.
The research study, which targeted 322…