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Chapter 47 - Case Study 3: Lessons from Delivering Support for Staff Working at the Nightingale COVID-19 Hospital in London

from Section 5 - Sustaining and Caring for Staff During Emergencies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 January 2024

By
Derek K Tracy  and
Neil Greenberg
Edited by
Richard Williams ,
Verity Kemp ,
Keith Porter ,
Tim Healing  and
John Drury
Richard Williams
Affiliation:
University of South Wales
Verity Kemp
Affiliation:
Independent Health Emergency Planning Consultant
Keith Porter
Affiliation:
University of Birmingham
Tim Healing
Affiliation:
Worshipful Society of Apothecaries of London
John Drury
Affiliation:
University of Sussex
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Summary

The London Nightingale was designed to be the largest field hospital in UK peacetime history. It was built in a matter of weeks on the site of an existing exhibition centre, with a final capacity planned for 4,000 intubated patients who had COVID-19, and 16,000 clinical staff. Supporting the mental health of its staff was a key element from its inception, with a specialist team engaged to create and implement an evidence-based, tiered, occupational health model. The emphasis was on minimising distress and moral injury, and maximising post-traumatic growth through a rapid, de-medicalised, forward psychiatry model that encouraged return to work where possible. The London Nightingale was fortunately never required at anything near its capacity, but the mental health team was operational throughout its life, and openly disseminated its standard operating policy and learning to other UK hospitals, many of which used it as a template to design their own.

Keywords

COVID-19forward psychiatryLondon Nightingalemental healthmoral injurypost-traumatic growth
Type
Chapter
Information
Major Incidents, Pandemics and Mental Health
The Psychosocial Aspects of Health Emergencies, Incidents, Disasters and Disease Outbreaks
 , pp. 355 - 359
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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References

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