Beliefs, attachment style and secondary trauma as predictors of burnout in care staff for looked after children.

Work-related stress (including burnout and occupational stress) are an increasing
threat to people’s wellbeing at work. Despite their common occurrence among
staff in healthcare settings, little effort has been put into researching unregistered
care staff. This is a group of healthcare employees who are exposed to
significant stressors while executing frontline care tasks in health and social care
settings, and who are not registered with a governing body. The first chapter
explores the effectiveness of different interventions aimed at easing work-related
stress in care staff. This chapter reviewed thirteen published studies and
identified the emotional exhaustion component of burnout, involving tension,
irritability and fatigue, as the most significant factor. Research is varied and often
not based on evidence-based factors, such as organisational factors, known to
contribute towards work-related stress. The significant design and
methodological limitations of the studies reviewed limit the conclusions that can
be drawn regarding the effectiveness of such interventions. In response to this,
the second paper explores the influence of individual factors on burnout in a
sample of care staff for looked after children, a currently under researched
population who work with vulnerable and traumatised children. This study used
multiple regression to analyse a range of predictors of burnout: attachment
styles, beliefs, secondary trauma, previous traumatic events and time worked
with looked after children. Results indicated that secondary trauma, and
secondary trauma avoidance specifically, is a highly significant predictor for all
burnout dimensions. These findings were explored in relation to their clinical
implications, including their contribution towards the development of interventions
for those working with looked after children. The final chapter provides a first
person reflective commentary on the process and completion of this project, and
further considers the findings of the literature review and the empirical paper.