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New research into the impact of rescue work on mental and physical health, and intention to leave the sector has been published. This research is impactful and relevant not only for rescue workers and volunteers themselves, but also for leaders of organisations such as shelters, rescue groups, council facilities, and vets, as it outlines preventative measures that organisations can take to protect the health of their staff working with animals.
PetRescue was honoured to be working with researchers from La Trobe University for the first time on PetRescue’s 2024 Sector Survey as part of its annual State of Pet Adoption Report.
The survey was completed by 285 people working and volunteering with pets within rescue organisations, shelters and council facilities in Australia, and the results were shared in a paper by Remi Lezon, Dr Vanessa Rohlf, Dr Diana Rayment and Dr Tiffani Howell from La Trobe University. The paper The Impact of Job Demands, Job Resources, and Organisational Justice on Global Health and Turnover Intentions in Animal Care Workers, was published earlier this year.
We spoke to Dr Vanessa Rohlf and Honours student Remi Lezon to hear about their key findings and what they mean for the thousands of dedicated and hardworking rescue workers and volunteers across Australia.
Article summary & key findings:
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Rescue workers and volunteers report significantly lower physical and mental health compared to the general population, with many scoring below clinical thresholds - highlighting a risk of long-term health issues.
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Direct exposure to euthanasia correlates with poorer health outcomes, even when workers don’t perceive it as distressing - suggesting unconscious or unacknowledged stress effects.
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Among various workplace resources, peer and social support was the only factor shown to significantly improve both physical and mental health.
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Researchers recommend that rescue organisations adopt regular, voluntary health monitoring (similar to emergency services) and implement task rotation to reduce burnout and improve job satisfaction.
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The study emphasises the importance of creating "communities of care" and encouraging rescue workers and volunteers to prioritise their own wellbeing alongside their dedication to animal care.
What did the paper investigate?
The paper examined how various job demands, common among animal care workers, may affect different aspects of their health. Specifically, it looked at mental and physical health encompassed as ‘global health’. The researchers also looked at factors that may positively affect health, such as the availability of resources and support, and individual perceptions of fairness in rescue work settings (organisational justice).
One important focus in this study was the impact of rescue work on physical health. Past research has mentioned that some day-to-day tasks and roles that animal care workers undertake may have a negative physical effect. This could be the actual physical labour of the job, or the physiological impacts of psychological or emotional stress caused by the work. However, this has not been deeply explored in previous research examining the impact of rescue and sheltering work, so the team took on the challenge to find out more.
What are the paper’s key findings, and what do they mean for people working and volunteering in the rescue sector?
The paper found that average measures of both mental and physical health in survey participants were significantly below the averages of the general population. For the measures used in the survey, there is a recognised cut-off score for what is considered poor mental and physical health, and a significant number of the people in this group scored below that cut-off. This may indicate that these participants will need to seek medical attention at some point for work-related health challenges or need more intervention now to avoid further long-term risks to their health.
“We've been able to extend previous findings that the work can have a physical impact as well as a mental impact. Particularly in those roles that can involve quite alarming and traumatic things, such as working in euthanasia or being responsible for making euthanasia decisions, or even just working in rescue roles more generally.
While it wasn’t a major focus of this paper, we considered that the physical health decline found in our study may be related to the repeated exposure and physiological heightening of some animal shelter roles, as existing research considers this to have significant implications for cardiovascular and respiratory health, and similar,” Remi explains.
One specific factor that this work examined was direct and indirect exposure to euthanasia and its impact. Direct euthanasia exposure specifically predicted significantly lower scores in both physical and mental health. Interestingly, feedback from a number of respondents indicated that they didn't feel euthanasia was an overly impactful aspect of their role; it was a part of the job in their mind, and wasn’t something that they identified as having a large impact on themselves. This may indicate that even though direct euthanasia exposure does not feel particularly impactful or distressing to many in the sector, it may still negatively impact their health.
Interestingly, there was little to no significant relationship between physical health and intentions to leave either one's role or the rescue sector altogether. Mental health did have a weak correlation with intentions to leave the sector; however, the researchers didn’t see this as a predictive relationship. Notably, many survey participants were highly experienced in the sector, with the majority of respondents having been in the sector for over five years, meaning that people early in their journey in the sector may be underrepresented in these results. Previous research has found that over time, rescue workers can build up a lot of resilience as they become familiar with the expectations of the sector. Additionally, rescue workers may see their roles as a ‘calling’, that they feel passionate about, feel a responsibility for, and gain extra satisfaction out of performing. It’s also important to note that around a third of those who completed the survey aren’t paid any form of income for their work in the sector, and we don’t yet know if there is a difference in how this work impacts volunteers and paid workers.
“These are beautifully passionate people who care so much about their work. Many of these people in this cohort are doing it not for a wage, but because they're really committed to the cause. But committed to the point where, perhaps, they're neglecting some of their own needs, and their health is really important. In order to be sustainable in this work, whether it's paid or unpaid, I'd really like us to value our own health so that we can continue to do the work that we want to do; being true to the cause doesn't mean having to work yourself to the bone, to the point where it's impacting your health.
We often say, ‘you've got to put your oxygen mask on first’, and I think many people get it, but in practice, it's very hard to do. I believe many people in this sector will put others' needs, particularly the needs of the animals, before their own. Unfortunately, as we've seen sometimes with this research is that it does impact mental health, and it does lead to leaving the profession, and we certainly don't want that, and we certainly don't want the work to impact anyone's physical or mental health because they're important and we value them,” Dr Rohlf says.
The researchers also aimed to find out which resources may alleviate some of these job demands somewhat, or simply have some positive effect on health. They looked at a number of factors such as autonomy, constructive feedback in the workplace, and social support. Of these, social support was the only notable and significant factor that accounted for positive variance in both health domains.
“Having peer support around, whether that be to help point out health concerns that you may not see in yourself or just providing general social support, and knowing that you're not alone in things, was reflected as quite a positive thing,” Remi adds.
What impact and outcomes are the researchers hoping for?
The authors of the paper shared some tangible recommendations that they hope shelters, rescues and councils can implement for their workers and volunteers. The first major area was around increased monitoring and awareness of mental and physical health.
Remi shares, “I’d love to see a greater uptake of health monitoring and awareness at an organisational level, as a norm, because so many people who are doing these jobs are not stopping to sit and think about how they feel. Things like keeping regular, voluntary and confidential records of health that use simple questionnaires, such as the PROMIS Global Health 10 Question scale we used for this research, could be used to help people manage work-related impacts on their wellbeing. Similar health monitoring is already being done among emergency responders, nurses, doctors, and other healthcare professionals. I think that, as far as the workers who do it regularly, this would help control for differences in baseline and interpretations of health because you're using the same questionnaire.
For individual workers, it would help a lot to increase their own awareness and help with identifying actionable changes in themselves, if they can see that certain things are dropping off after 6 months or a year. Also, for some people who are maybe less understanding of the different ways their health can be impacted, it might improve their understanding. And generally, I think just having those check-ins helps people to identify when to take breaks or make other personal accommodations for their health, and I think seeing that reflected in data as well is a very understandable and justifiable way to explain that to people around you.”
Secondly, the researchers hoped to see, where possible, councils, shelters, and rescue organisations implement job and task rotations amongst staff to positively impact global health and general fulfilment within their roles.
“We looked at the idea of job rotations, which is applicable more to specific organisations in the sector, but we know the challenges to a certain extent are unavoidable. There are some obvious realities with things like capacity constraints, rescue work and euthanasia and things that just do make the job really hard. In certain organisations where there might be more defined role structures and people are doing given things, where possible, having some sort of rotating schedule of jobs, which again is quite common in human healthcare roles, and similar. Even if you're transitioning from one stressful job to a different stressful job, that freshness and sharing of the load has been shown to help with psychological and physical health and also just general fulfilment, such as job satisfaction,” Remi tells us.
Lastly, the researchers stress the importance of leaning on social and peer support for rescue workers;
“For those people in rescue, especially those who aren't paid, or aren't perhaps working in large organisations, [we] encourage really leaning into your support networks. That can include your colleagues, understanding friends and family including your pets, and professional mental health supports. Working in this sector can be immensely satisfying but it can also mean we are exposed to some pretty upsetting things and it can be very emotionally demanding at times. I think leaning into social support networks, and creating communities of care around yourself can be really helpful and lighten the load. So please don't be afraid to ask for support. Be proactive about it and ask for support early too because we know early intervention leads to better health outcomes. Give support to others when it's feasible to do so. Fostering these types of supportive communities where we all check in with one another, where we can feel ok to ask for support and help others out when we can, really can help people in the sector.” Dr Rohlf shares.
Looking into the future of research
The authors are currently undertaking further work in this area, with Dr Rohlf supervising another Honours student exploring factors predicting well-being, and intentions to leave, in Animal Management Officers and rangers. Additionally, they are exploring wellbeing in dog groomers and also plan to for further explorations of the data collected from the sector survey. The researchers are also exploring the area of trauma-informed care in veterinary services (and hopefully expanding that to the rescue sector), which is currently used in various human service areas, but hasn’t been explored in depth in an animal care context (all three survey links are below).
"The information we gather in these areas will help improve the sector, enhance wellbeing and mental health and ultimately that's a big win for the animals we care for." Dr Rohlf says about this research.
Thank you to all of the respondents from the rescue community who generously shared their experiences as part of last year’s Sector Survey.
Survey links:
Approaches to Client Care and Veterinary Staff Wellbeing
Investigating Workplace Wellbeing Among Dog Groomers in Australia
Further reading:
Read more about the collaborative research projects that PetRescue has been involved in.
Banner image credit: Mart Production
