Self-Help Strategies
This section offers a variety of brief, practical strategies aimed at helping you manage work-related stress, burnout, and secondary traumatic stress (STS). Self-care strategies can reduce burnout and stress symptoms. A broad range of personal resources, including recreational activities, self-care activities, social support, and cognitive coping skills have been shown to be predictive of less emotional exhaustion and greater personal accomplishment. 23-27Generally, studies investigating interventions to reduce burnout combine elements in a number of different categories (i.e., contemplative practices such as mindfulness and meditation, social practices such as developing support and setting limits, physical practices such as breathing retraining, cognitive practices such as cognitive restructuring, and meaning-based practices like values clarification). These interventions have had mixed results, and generally experts in this field have recommended diligence in putting a number of tailored self-care strategies in place, in concert with advocating for more supportive work environments.23-27
As a provider you are well aware that there are many different ways to address stress; the key is to learn which strategies work best for you, and to put them into practice in a consistent, disciplined way.28-37
