Mar 25 2009
The rapidly growing crisis of mood disorders in the workplace
I recently read last Saurday’s Los Angeles times
To read the full article go to the news section of www.IamBackFromTheBrink.com
It provides some pretty startling results from a recent survey:
- 70% of US residents are experiencing significant stress due to the current state of the economy
- 49% say they have regular anxiety
- 48% are sad or depressed
- 33% are experiencing insomnia
A 2007 Medicare Private funded research study showed:
Absenteeism costs the Australian economy $7 billion whilst presenteeism (where workers are not fully engaged due to distress or illness) accounts for $25billion. They found that the greatest contributor to this lost productivity was depression.
An estimate of the cost of depression in Australia is $6.3billion.
A 2007 report ”How to improve the behavoural health of an organisation” by the global consulting firm Sibson showed:
- Mental health issues (of which depression and anxiety contribute the vast majority) account for 47% of all lost productivity compared to 26% for physical illnesses.
So how comfortable are people with depression talking with work colleagues about it?
With the level of stress faced by the workforce highlighted above, you would hope that employees would feel comfortable dsicussing their depression with work colleagues. In research I did for my first book I found the disturbing result that only 9% could discuss this situation with confidence it would not adversely affect how their peers viewed them.
I have recently been asked to be a judge for a writing competition by the Black Dog Institute called “Tackling mood disorders in the workplace”. The 100+ essays I read revealed the sad situation where people with mood disorders are on the whole, terrified of revealing their conditon to fellow employees for fear it will jeopardise their career prospects.
This situation is untenable, and on April 1st I will be speaking at a forum for 100 HR professional hosted by the outplacement, and career planning organisation www.Directioneering.com to highlight the absurdity of this.
I will also be outlining what I believe is an achieveable path forward to make the workplace as friendly to those with mental illness as it is to people with cancer, a broken leg, blindness or any other physical disability.
In my next blog entry I will address this way forward. If you have any comments regarding what has been outlined, please respond to this blog.
Kind Regards
Graeme
Hi Graeme,
I have been going through depression for around 9 months now. I had two instances at work, where I publically broke down in front of staff and admitted to my employers that I had depression. I was offered “time off” and had leave owing to me, but declined as I was keen to keep things normal as possible. I felt if that I stayed at home alone my guilt and paranoia would just increase, I belived that staying at work would keep my mind off myself. I told my employer I would go with what what was decided. I work in aged care.
They told me I could stay which was a relief. But soon after my peers and myself were sent any email informing that I (using my name) was unable to attend to my “full duties” although I was normally to do such and I had to have a weekly debriefing by my employer and some fellow employees were involved. It was very embarrasing, but I went though it. I never had a breakdown at work again. At one meeting I was told that it was hoped that they (my employer) would not use my problem against me retaining employment at my job.
It was all very negative. But I have learnt from it. Now that I am slowly getting better I respond about my health positively, even though I may fell terrible. Getting on with the job and keeping things stable are going to help me with my recovery. Thank god that I attend a weekly GROW meeting, they have kept me from getting too emotional about other people’s reactions. I would love to see employers or supervisors with knowledge about depression. I would like to see some access to counsellors through work, I know there are employers who have programs for staff who require some counselling. I would like to see that mandatory. It may not be depression for some people, they may need a little guidence through work or something with their home life! I also would like to see all workplaces offering private health care that staff can pay weekly or monthly through their pay.
I still have a long way to go. I feel that support/knowledge through the workplace would be a iniative for people to choose positive things to get better and maybe (if they can) stay at work.
Thank you
Leisa
Dear Mr Cowan
I caught only the end of the ‘depression in the workplace’ on ABC Radio National Life Matters program yesterday. So you may have covered the issues I am discussing below earlier in the program. I just wanted to provide some feedback.
I suffered depression about 15 years ago, so have some appreciation of how debilitating it can be. Since that time, I have been very cognisant of the challenges people with any time of mental health issues face in our society and am supportive of initiatives to assist them. I was a volunteer on LifeLine for several years as part of contributing to this. This is to say that I have some familiarity with mental health issues and am committed to helping people with mental issues, who I think are perhaps the most maligned in our society.
With respect to return to work with people suffering with depression, I think what is overlooked in the rush to assist the person is the impact of that person on others in the workplace. Well, at least this has been my experience.
I work for a large Victorian government department. While there are many encouraging signs about how they deal with mental health (posters, articles in newsletters with all the right motherhood statements), the reality on the ground (for me at least) was sorely lacking. At the time of the below experience, I even went to a training session on mental health awareness which unfortunately completely useless (provided me with no tools or strategies or practical steps to deal with the situation I was dealing with).
In the last few years I worked with someone suffering with severe depression and found this an extremely challenging, draining and difficult experience. My colleague told me that he had a psychiatrist whom he saw regularly. The psychiatrist advised him to at all costs continue working. But here are some of the problems that my colleagues and I, a small team, faced in working with the person:
* unexplained absences for days or weeks on end - there was no calling in sick, he would just not turn up.
* other team members having to pick up this person’s (fulltime) workload regularly and at short notice
* Severe mood swings whilst at work and from day to day. He could be a completely different person from one day to the next. It is very difficult to work with someone who is so severley depressed to the point of barely being able to talk.
* Some days the person presented very poorly - it was questionable whether he had brushed his hair or showered.
* At times he spoke of suicide.
I was wholly supportive of this person’s recovery and wanted to assist (to the extent appropriate for a colleague). However, it was an EXTREMELY stressful and taxing experience for me. To his psychiatrist who kept telling him to go to work at all costs, I wanted to say (or scream in exasperation!), that might be best for your patient, but it’s having severe adverse impacts on me and my colleagues! (Eventually he was terminated with minimal explanation. It seems that everyone lost out in this situation and the whole thing could have been handled better).
I’m sure you appreciate that people suffering from depression to work is not a matter of simply throwing them back in the workplace, or making them keep going to work no matter what… there needs to be a much more HOLISTIC, with comprehensive hands on support from management and HR. Otherwise it leaves the co-workers - who whilst most times wanting to be supportive - drowning.
I just wanted to share my experience. I wish you continued good health and success with your initiatives.
Regards,
Hilary
Hi Lisa and Hilary,
Both of you stress the importance of work in regaining our mental health. I know that it is preferred to try to stay involed with the work place when you are trying to recover. In most situations this is achievable if co workers can be supportive and flexible regarding the hours worked by the person who isn’t coping.
Hilary raises the point that some people can be too depressed to be at work as it can have a negative effect on co workers and clients. If this is the case common sense must prevail.
There were times when I wasn’t able to cope with work and thank fully I was able to with draw when it was necessary.
Kind Regards
Graeme
Hi Graeme,
This is an interesting topic. I work in a medium sized organisation and I have periods when I have anxiety & depression. The company I work for is a risk assessment consulting company and while I work in the environmental risk side, we also have an Occupational Health & Safety (OHS) side. Despite the OHS component of the business, mental health in the workplace is NEVER spoken about. Indeed, not long after a young graduate OHS consultant sent an interesting article about mental health risks in the workplace, she was terminated. We’ve also had a another employee with (what we eventually guessed) were significant mental health issues and he was quietly let go.
I believe that this situation is the norm in private small to medium businesses in Australia.
I think my boss can guess by my behaviour that I experience significant anxiety and depression issues but it’s like an unspoken rule that we never ever refer to it or name it. I am pretty sure that she also has experienced anxiety & some depressive episodes which is why she is moderately understanding. At the same time keeping up the front of being well and coping is an incredible strain sometimes. There are many times when I have to lie to her about my illness to be able to get a day off work. And then I feel guilty and have make the time up by working on the weekend or working from home. it’s really exhausting but if I am to keep my job I have to do these things.
Hi Kirsten,
I cannot tell you how common your response is. I have just been a judge in the Black Dog Institutes writing competition called “Tackling Mood Disorders in the Workplace”. After reading 280 submissions it really horrifies me how much fear and stigma is associated with mood disorders in the work context. What was particularly worrying were people that worked in the mental health field (such as yourself), having to hide their condition for fear of being adversely affected by the disclosure.
There is no doubt this is a form of discrimination. Mood disorders are the greatest cause of productivity loss in the workplace yet of the people living with it, only 9% feel comfortable discussing it with their work colleagues.
There is no easy solution but things have to change because of the pure absurdity of the situation. The economic cost must eventually prevail if not the common human decency element.
I would be very interested to hear other peoples comments on this. Tomorrow I will be publishing a judges summary of the BDI competition.
Kind Regards
Graeme
Hi Graeme
I would like to share a positive experience.
I have been experiencing major depression for the past 2 years. I was working for a large hospital as a physiotherapist and although I was extremely reluctant to show any hint of my illness, it came to a point due to my own forced hospital admissions and time off work where I had to disclose the situation to my boss. The reaction of both my bosses and some of my senior colleagues was amazing. They were extremely supportive and sensitive in every possible way even though I was a fairly new employee. They encouraged me to stay at work whenever possible and my colleagues all pulled together whenever I had to take time off. If I was having a bad day I could just pop into their office and take some time out or they would try to find computer based tasks to take my mind off things. In addition our hospital has a free staff counseling service and this was great when I couldn’t wait for my next appointment with my psychologist or psychiatrist or I was in crisis mode. Often I would go and have a cry with either a colleague or the counsellor, and then pull myself together to finish off the day.
I was able to stay at work for 2 years, which enabled me to get through the worst of things and not go further down the spiral.
Only recently have I voluntarily resigned because I feel that I currently would be better suited to part time work, and this is something they couldn’t really offer me there. They certainly didn’t let me go without a fight though!
I am currently looking for part time work, however my biggest fear is that my prospective employer will discriminate against me if they ask my referees about my sick leave record. Hopefully this will not be the case.
I guess the point I am trying to get across is that the acceptance of my work colleagues was integral to my recovery and essential for anyone trying to survive a full time job whilst simultaneously battling with a mental illness. Not having to hide it 100% of the time was the key because it gave me that little bit of extra support to keep fighting though the rest of the day.