How do we encourage a change of behaviour around colleagues taking breaks?

There is increasing evidence that in order to ensure colleagues are able to deliver safe, high-quality care from the beginning to the end of a shift we must prioritise breaks.1–3 Taking a break can include eating or having a drink, a physical rest or for some a walk or fresh air. Regular rest is essential, especially when busy or working overnight and for reducing work-related stress. There is growing support and enthusiasm for prioritising colleague breaks in order to simultaneously improve colleague well-being (particularly work-related stress), and to therefore also improve patient safety. Within NHS Trusts there have been some high-profile campaigns started, we believe at Guys and St Thomas’.1 The British Medical Association (BMA) are also launching their #giveusabreak campaign.2 The Health Education England (HEE) National Health Service (NHS) Mental Wellbeing report highlights this.3 Across our NHS Trust we have relaunched our HALT (are you Hungry, Angry, Late or Tired?) campaign with poster and enhanced communications; baseline data indicated poor levels of break-taking (44% of colleagues ‘always’ or ‘mostly’ take a break, June 2019) and high levels of stress (52% …