– they need mental health programme, says senior psychologist

AS Guyana celebrated Universal Health Coverage Day earlier last week, Principal Nursing Tutor of the Georgetown School of Nursing Cleopatra Barkoye renewed her call for the initiation of a programme to address the mental health of nurses.
Her call was supported by senior psychologist of the Ministry of Public Health, Mental Health Unit, Balogun Osunbiyi.

“Midwives and nurses that are in the forefront of the health care system, but they’re not paid attention to in how do they de-stress to go again. There is no such programme and I think that is one area that we need to look at if we’re talking Universal Health Care. It’s not good not to take care of your own,” Osunbiyi related.

With over 29 years of experience in the sector, Barkoye has seen first-hand the toll that mental stress can have on the psyche of nurses.

“I remember many years ago I was receiving my training in midwifery and a midwife had a fresh still birth and she cried and she cried and she cried and no amount of help from her colleagues could console her. Now that midwife had to go home and come again and do the same thing all over again. No one to talk to, and that’s a sad thing that has been happening time and time again,” Osunbiyi pointed out.

Osunbiyi has also been in the seat of emotional distress in the line of duty.

“I have cried many times. I had a birth patient years ago and she wanted to say something to me, but I was busy getting my cares done. And when I came to her bedside she was no longer with me, and I cried and I cried. When I went to work at the intensive care, my first patient that died I cried so much,” Osunbiyi recalled.

Though nurses in Guyana have long since operated without support for mental health demands, of late, calls have been made to address this problem.

During the Guyana Nurses Association’s (GNA) 90th anniversary and Global Guyanese Nurses Reunion Conference last August, Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP), Dr Jacqueline Gulstone called for the mental health needs of nurses to be addressed.

ALWAYS HESITANT
“Nurses are always hesitant to let people know that they are having some problems in terms of mental health, because they’re worried about their jobs… so instead, they keep everything bottled up,” Dr. Gulstone noted.

Though it may be a ‘hush-hush’ topic, mental health issues are more prevalent among nurses than one might think; the effects can be manifested in how the nurses handle their responsibilities.

“Sometimes you see nurses and midwives lash out and you don’t understand why; for me personally, I feel that they lash out because they have nowhere to turn to,” reasoned Osunbiyi.

“I see it as a cry for help when nurses and midwives behave in a manner that’s not professional, because we were trained to prepare to be professional in all of our dealings; but there is a limit for every human being. It’s not an excuse for them, but I think it’s a cry for help, we need to help.”

Over the past few years, Guyana has been putting emphasis on addressing mental health issues, following the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) declaration in 2014 that Guyana had the highest suicide rate in the world. Guyana then had topped the list at 44.2 per 100,000 people.

“Nurses need help,” agreed Osunbiyi. Nursing is one of a number of professions where Osunbiyi believes health care programmes should be made available.

“We have to meet a point where we look at the issue of professional self-care, that is, providing care for those who are providing care for the public. Our focus now is one the public mental health needs and that’s of critical urgency; but at some point down the road we have to also look at the mental health needs of professionals, whether doctors, lawyers, policemen, and soldiers, because these people work in toxic environments,” the senior psychologist said.