Burnout/turnover - Outpatient setting

[m061613]

I am a psychiatric nurse practitioner working a busy practice alongside a psychiatrist who has an even busier practice. I have noticed significant turnover with nursing staff since starting 1 year ago and I am wondering if anyone else has thoughts or suggestions to mitigate the risk of burnout among nursing staff in outpatient psychiatric clinic

Background information ~

The clinic is currently operates by transferring patient calls to the psychiatric nurses (2 LPN's and 1 RN) who triage the call and take messages to send to the providers. I notice that the nurses are often on the phone for long periods of time with patients, often difficult patients and difficult conversations. Nurses have described that the phone calls are a big stressor and consume a great deal of their time. Also, nurses have described that another stressor is that they feel that they are not able to interact with patients as much as they would like as they are often consumed with phone calls and triage. In addition, our RN feels that she is not being utilized appropriately according to scope and feels that there are a lot of tasks that she could be delegating.

I am just wondering if anyone has any input or experience in the operation and work flow of an outpatient psychiatric clinic and if anyone has any suggestions to decrease turnover. I understand that much of the outpatient role involves handling phone calls and triage, but I am just curious how other clinics operate.

Thanks

[nickfitz1969]

I think that for the most part you have answered your own question; "Nurses have described that the phone calls are a big stressor and consume a great deal of their time, ....not able to interact with patients...and not being utilized appropriately according to scope...".

Do clinicians' on exiting the service, have exit interviews to identify the issues for them leaving? Regular clinical feedback or supervision might help with staff retention or the ability to feel valued and heard. There are a multitude of reasons why people leave work environments!