The annual NHS Staff Survey, in which nearly 600,000 employees took part, has revealed the immense pressure many NHS staff members have suffered due to the pandemic.
The survey included staff from over 280 NHS organisations and took place between September and December 2020 via either a postal form or online.
The report revealed some alarming statistics, including that 44% of staff reported being ill due to work-related stress and 46.4% said they have gone into work in the last three months, despite not feeling well enough to perform their duties.
The report went on to compare the numbers of staff working additional unpaid hours.
The results found that over half of staff (55.2%) continue to work additional unpaid hours on a weekly basis.
This proportion declined between 2018 (58.0%) and 2019 (55.9%) and has continued to decline this year.
This decline was observed this year in all trust types, except for Mental Health/Learning Disability Trusts (including Combined MH/LD and Community Trusts).
For the MH/LD sector, there was a slight increase between 2019 to 2020 from 60.2% to 60.5%.
In fact, the proportion of staff working additional unpaid hours remains above the national average in Community, Mental Health/Learning Disability and Acute Specialist Trusts.
Despite these findings, the proportion of staff who are considering leaving their current NHS organisation has decreased by 2% since 2019 (down from 35.8% to 33.8%) and continues an improving trend since 2018 (37.4%).
The proportion of staff who are considering leaving the NHS altogether has decreased by 1% since 2019 (down from 19.6% to 18.2%) and has also seen year on year improvement since 2018 (21.0%).
