Self-care is important for everyone. But with its high stakes and emotional ups and downs, healthcare work tends to require it even more. Here’s a look at what it is, why it's important, and what self-care tips nurses and healthcare workers can start practicing right now.
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What Is Self-Care, and Why Does It Matter?
Self-care is a term you probably hear a lot. But what does it really mean, and why is it so important for healthcare professionals?
Basically, self-care is just what it sounds like — taking care of yourself. But it also means prioritizing your health with every decision you make. And that means self-care goes beyond just making healthy choices. It requires actively working to make sure you’re as healthy as you can be, every day.
Why Is Self-Care So Important for Nurses and Other Healthcare Professionals?
High-stakes decisions. Emotional interactions with patients and families. Long hours. Exposure to serious trauma and illness. Healthcare is demanding work, with very little room for error.
Mistakes made during the course of care affect hundreds of thousands of people each year, ranging from falls to medication errors and worse. Errors have even been described as the third-leading cause of death in the United States. They can also impact quality scores, which could have professional repercussions.
Of course, knowing all of this can make healthcare jobs even more stressful, and it may be one reason why nurses experience such a high level of burnout. According to one study, 91.1% of nurses reported feeling “high levels of burnout,” compared to 79.9% for all healthcare workers.
...and Why Is Self-Care in Healthcare So Hard to Achieve?
All of that responsibility can also take a physical toll. The burnout that too often comes with healthcare work has been linked to depression, anxiety, weight gain, high blood pressure, and possibly even autoimmune disorders.
Those conditions can make it even harder to prioritize self-care. Even in the best of times, healthcare is the type of work that never stops, rarely giving you much time to focus on yourself. And on top of busy schedules and long hours, healthcare workers are used to putting others first, and often feel guilty for stepping away, even for a moment.
10 Essential Self-Care Tips for Healthcare Workers
Yet ignoring self-care is not an option! Doing the best possible job you can literally requires you to set aside time for yourself. And here are 10 key ways that busy nurses and clinicians can do just that.
#1: Pay Attention to Your Stress Levels
It can be hard to keep track of your own well-being when you’re busy. So, make sure to give yourself time to identity some of the key signs of stress common to healthcare work, including:
- Physical symptoms like headaches, back pain, or trouble sleeping
- Mental struggles like confusion, or trouble thinking, concentrating, or making decisions
- Emotional feelings of fatigue, anxiety, anger, or irritability, or a sense of imbalance
- High-risk lifestyle choices like excessive drinking or social isolation
#2: Focus on Teamwork & Positive Social Interaction
One way to center and nurture yourself is by making a point to support, understand, and communicate with the people on your team. That can mean asking for help if you need it, or just talking through the many different issues that come up during the course of your job.
- Pro Tip: Find a “buddy” at work who you can check it with, and vice versa.
- Words of Wisdom: “I find comfort in other nurses, not just locally but across the U.S.,” as Heather Godfrey, a nurse working in North Logan, Utah, told us during the pandemic. “We are all in this together and have to support each other. You can’t do it by yourself — you have to rely on your team.”
#3: Take Care of Your Body
A big part of emotional and mental health is making sure you’re physically healthy. And that means taking a little bit of time to:
- Keep up with your routine healthcare screenings and physicals.
- Take short breaks during the day, even if it’s just a few minutes to stretch, take a quick walk outside or maybe do a little yoga, if there’s space for it.
- Stop smoking and cut down on drinking.
- Stay active by hitting the gym before or after work a few times a week.
- Ride a bike to work, if that’s an option where you live.
- Wear quality footwear that supports your health — see our guide to shoes here.
- Find discounts on gym memberships, fitness gear, and more in our guide to discounts for nurses and healthcare professionals.
#4: Don’t Skimp on Nutrition & Hydration
Nutrition matters! Fast food may taste good in the moment but it doesn’t do your body any favors, often leaving you feel tired and sluggish instead of energized and refueled. It might be a tough change, but just a few days of following a healthy diet will likely leave you feeling better and more energetic.
Similarly, staying hydrated is essential for physical and emotional health. Keep a water bottle or two handy and drink as much as you can during your shift. Add some vitamin water to keep your energy and nutrition levels up, too.
- Pro Tip: Bring a water bottle and snacks to work and keep them handy during the day. And if you're struggling to eat healthy after work, try a meal delivery service — you can find a few discounts here.
- Words of Wisdom: “My 'aha' moment in this journey came when I began substituting sparkling water with lime for red wine,” as HealthTrust nurse Carmelita Riley once told us. “I saved over 300 calories and more per week … I still use the wine glass though!”
#5: Sleep Well
We know it's easier said than done, but in a perfect world, you should get seven to nine hours of sleep a night, doing your best to go to bed and wake up at the same time every day.
- Pro Tip: If you're having trouble getting to sleep, try using earplugs or a sleep mask to drown out noise or light, and avoid using your phone or watching TV for an hour before you go to sleep.
#6: Set Boundaries
Setting boundaries means drawing a line between work and your day-to-day life, and knowing how and when to keep the emotional strain of the job out of your — and your family’s — personal space. And even more specifically, it means knowing when to say “no,” even if your instinct is to say yes.
- Pro Tip: If you need space, consider contract or travel work, which gives you the freedom to take time off between assignments (and usually pays more to make up for that time off). Learn more about the benefits of traveling here.
#7: Set Goals, Priorities, and a Routine
Set yourself up for self-care success by setting a routine and sticking with it. Because this also requires getting organized, it can also make your day-to-day life seem less stressful. It could also help improve your job performance, which could benefit you in other ways, including helping you land better opportunities in the future.
- Pro Tip: Of course, not everything can be planned for in your routine. If you find yourself hit with unexpected challenges during the day, try setting priorities. That could be starting with the things that are small and easy to manage and then moving on to the bigger challenges, or vice versa.
#8: Work to Find Personal Joy & Positivity
Even though it’s okay to feel depressed, it’s also important to take steps to get in a healthier mindset, particularly during working hours. And like any other part of your job, this can take work! While we can’t turn a “happy” switch on and off, we can take a positive approach to the task in front of us at any given time.
Another way to approach self-care is by making your off hours more meaningful. That could include finding a new hobby (pickleball, anyone?) to volunteering for a good cause to just taking one day off a week to relax and recharge at home.
- Pro Tip: Travel, local, and per diem contracts can give you the work/life flexibility to focus on personal goals. Browse hundreds of contract jobs here.
#9: Take Advantage of the Resources Available to You
Whether from online sources or through your employer, you have many resources available to you — maybe lots more than you think! For instance, workers in the HCA Healthcare network have access to the HCA Inspire app, which offers a chance to network with more than 90,000 other professionals, find career growth opportunities, connect with mentors, and much more. Learn more here.
- Pro Tip: Search Google to easily find free resources from the ANA's Healthy Nurse Healthy Nation initiative to this guide to the best self-care nursing apps like Nursewell, Headspace, and Fifth Window.
#10: Take Control of Your Schedule
Feeling burned out? Local, travel, and per diem contract jobs are for set periods of time, usually 13 weeks, giving you the option to take off in between assignments to recharge or focus on other goals without abandoning your career. And thanks to the variety that contract work offers, you’ll have plenty of new skills and experience to offer when you’re ready to grab another permanent role.
- Get Started: Read more about the many benefits of working allied travel jobs here, travel nursing here, and per diem contracts here.
Find Your Next Career Opportunity with HealthTrust
Whether you're seeking a change of scenery or a better work/life balance, there's lots to love about contract work. And we've got the opportunities to suit your best interests: Book your next assignment directly on the HealthTrust jobsite to get exclusive access to hundreds of great jobs across the United States right now!
