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Too many healthcare workplaces allow physicians and other staff to resort to self-harm.

Gaslighting responses to this tragic outcome may reinforce employees' belief that their struggle is internal.

Gaslighting may lead to a focus on mental illness to deflect from occupational hazards facing employees.

The workplace is treacherous at present. From job loss threatened by AI, to scapegoating truth-tellers, to funds being funnelled to the top of corporations while workers can hardly stay afloat in a cost-of-living crisis, it’s too easy for employees to internalize the stress and the injustice. Workers may believe their suffering is a personal defect, rather than recognizing a systemic failure of modern society that benefits the wealthy and abandons workers.

Drawing on the research of trauma expert Dr. Heliana Ramirez, who studies suicides among healthcare workers, we see that it could be life-saving to assess one’s workplace for potential risk factors that negatively impact mental health. Considering that in America “suicide is the second leading cause of death for medical residents in training,” as Ramirez highlights, being proactive about one's work environment and conditions is a critical safety issue.

When Ramirez notes that suicide for “registered nurses, healthcare support workers, and mental health technicians” is even higher than it is for medical residents and physicians, we realize how necessary it is for employees to be informed and trained to assess dangers to themselves at work.

Ramirez encourages us to reframe extreme work stress and work trauma-related mental “illness” as mental “injury.” Instead of asking what’s wrong with employees, we should ask “how were employees injured at work?” By focusing on the working conditions causing workplace trauma, we identify the source of the injury, which allows us to better protect those at risk.

What to do........

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