The impact of an animal assisted activity on healthcare worker well-being in the inpatient hospital setting

Abstract

Chronic stress and burnout experienced by healthcare workers has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Animal-assisted activities, traditionally patient-focused, have the potential to benefit healthcare worker well-being. With limited evidence to support animal assisted activities for healthcare workers within inpatient hospital settings, the purpose of this study was to evaluate the acceptability and impact of an animal assisted activity using therapy dogs on healthcare worker stress, burnout, work engagement, and mood. Using a quasi-experimental, waitlist control design, healthcare workers from paired medical intensive care and medical-surgical units served as intervention and waitlist control groups and were offered the animal assisted activity three times a week for eight weeks. Visits ranged from 20 to 60 minutes. Measures of stress, burnout, and work engagement were measured pre- and post-intervention. Self-reported mood was collected before and after each intervention with participants reporting weekly participation. Intervention acceptability was measured post-intervention. Differences between pre- and post-intervention measures of stress, burnout, work engagement, and mood were assessed with paired and independent samples t-tests; participation and acceptability were measured descriptively. Acceptability of the animal-assisted activity, rated on a scale of 1 to 10, was similar for both intervention (M=8.92; SD=1.256) and waitlist control (M=9.57; SD=.787) groups. Weekly participation for both groups averaged one to two per week. There were no significant improvements in stress, burnout, or work engagement. Self-reported mood increased significantly for the intervention group (p=.05). Our findings suggest that an animal assisted activity, available for healthcare workers within busy inpatient settings, may offer immediate benefits through improved mood. Further research is needed to better understand short and and long-term effects of animal assisted activity on healthcare worker, patient, and organizational outcomes.