Workplace Psychological Safety and Mental Health Help-Seeking among Healthcare Workers in Bangladesh: The Mediating Role of Organisational Trust
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.54536/jmhwb.v2i1.8692Keywords:
Bangladesh Healthcare Workers, Help-Seeking Intention, Mental Health Stigma, Organisational Trust, Perceived Access, Workplace Psychological SafetyAbstract
Healthcare professionals face continuous clinical, emotional and organisational pressure; however, when distress arises, it is not always sought in the form of professional mental health services. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between psychological safety in the workplace and the intention to seek mental health services among healthcare workers in Bangladesh and to determine if organisational trust acts as a mediator in this relationship. Perceived stigma of accessing mental health services in the workplace and perceived access to support were added as further explanatory variables. A cross-sectional quantitative survey was conducted and yielded 480 valid responses from healthcare workers in varying roles, organisation types, locations and tenure groups. Partial least squares structural equation modelling was used to assess the measurement and structural models. The measurement model had good indicator reliability, internal consistency, convergence and discrimination. Organisational trust and the help-seeking intention were positively and significantly correlated with workplace psychological safety, while perceived stigma was negatively and significantly correlated with workplace psychological safety. Organisational trust and perceived access had a positive relationship to help-seeking intention while stigma had a negative relationship. Organisational trust was a significant mediator in the connection between psychological safety and the help-seeking outcome. The explanatory power of the model was 53.4% for help-seeking intention. The results suggest that the psychologically safe, trusted, low-stigma and practically available work environment can reinforce the motivation of healthcare workers to access qualified mental health services if required in low-resource and diverse health care settings across the country.
References
Aranha, R., Saldanha, A., & Aranha, S. (2022). Frontline medical professionals in distress—“Doctor heal thyself.” Journal of Affective Disorders Reports, 10, 100444. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadr.2022.100444
Asadullah, A., Sadia, R., & Abdullah, A. (2022). How can Proactive Behavior be Encouraged in Hospitals in Bangladesh? A Three-Time Lags Study. Asian Business Review, 12(3), 57–66. https://doi.org/10.18034/abr.v12i3.655
Banerjee, D., Vijayakumar, H., & Sathyanarayana Rao, T. (2020). ”Watching the watchmen:” Mental health needs and solutions for the health-care workers during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. International Journal of Health & Allied Sciences, 9(5), 51. https://doi.org/10.4103/ijhas.IJHAS_87_20
Chen, Y. (2023). Methodology. In Y. Chen, Surface Plasmon Resonance Imaging (Vol. 95, pp. 91–164). Springer Nature Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-3118-7_4
Chowdhury, S. R., Sunna, T. C., Das, D. C., Kabir, H., Hossain, A., Mahmud, S., & Ahmed, S. (2021). Mental health symptoms among the nurses of Bangladesh during the COVID-19 pandemic. Middle East Current Psychiatry, 28(1), 23. https://doi.org/10.1186/s43045-021-00103-x
Doo, E.-Y., & Choi, S. (2022). Effect of Nurses’ Work Experiences in a COVID-19 Unit on Depression: Mediation Effect of Resilience and Moderated Mediation Effect of Organizational Trust. Frontiers in Public Health, 10, 897506. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2022.897506
Erdal, N., Filiz, M., & Budak, O. (2022). The effect of healthcare professionals perceptions of emotional commitmemt and organizational trust on the level of task performance. Pressacademia, 4. https://doi.org/10.17261/Pressacademia.2022.1650
Giusino, D., De Angelis, M., Mazzetti, G., Faiulo, I. R., Innstrand, S. T., Christensen, M., & Nielsen, K. (2022). Mentally Healthy Healthcare: Main Findings and Lessons Learned From a Needs Assessment Exercise at Multiple Workplace Levels. In C. A. Bowers, D. C. Beidel, M. R. Marks, K. Horan, & J. Cannon-Bowers (Eds.), Advances in Psychology, Mental Health, and Behavioral Studies (pp. 143–171). IGI Global. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-8813-0.ch008
Hoegh, J., Rice, G., Shetty, S., Ure, A., Cogan, N., & Peddie, N. (2023). Health and social care professionals’ experience of psychological safety within their occupational setting: A systematic thematic synthesis protocol. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/4u7hq
Hossain, Md. I., Mehedi, N., Ali, I., & Azman, A. (2023). Occupational Health of Frontline Workers during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Is Health and Well-Being an Issue in Bangladesh? Revista de Cercetare Si Interventie Sociala, 80, 18–39. https://doi.org/10.33788/rcis.80.2
Hunt, D. F., Bailey, J., Lennox, B. R., Crofts, M., & Vincent, C. (2021). Enhancing psychological safety in mental health services. International Journal of Mental Health Systems, 15(1), 33. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13033-021-00439-1
Huque, R., Azad, A. K., Islam, K., Ahmed, H. U., & Amin, Md. R. (2023). Mental Health Care Seeking Behavior in Bangladesh: Evidence from the National Mental Health Survey 2019. In Review. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-2736863/v1
Irfan, S. N., Kamal, A. K. M., Siddiquee, T. H., Bhuiyan, M. R., Mithun, S., & Hena Mostafa Alim, S. M. A. (2022). Predictors of Psychological Impact Among the Healthcare Workers Exposed to Covid-19 Cases in a Tertiary Hospital of Bangladesh. Journal of Preventive and Social Medicine, 40(1), 1–13. https://doi.org/10.3329/jopsom.v40i1.56685
Joshi, K., Modi, B., Singhal, S., & Gupta, S. (2023). Occupational Stress among Health Care Workers. In K. Palaniappan (Ed.), Identifying Occupational Stress and Coping Strategies. IntechOpen. https://doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.107397
Luce, A., Turner, G., Kennedy, L., & Bush-Evans, R. (2023). “People are just firefighting and coping with it, until they’re not”: Qualitative insights into barriers to staff seeking support before they reach crisis in an NHS Trust. https://doi.org/10.22541/au.167483883.38598448/v1
Mahmud, I., Azad, K. A. K., Mamun, A. A., Hoque, M. M., Mallik, M. U., Md Moniruzzaman, -, Saha, S., Mark, S. H. K., & Rahman, M. M. (2020). Psychological Assessment of Doctors Working in a Pandemic Condition in Dhaka Medical College Hospital. Journal of Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons, 50–55. https://doi.org/10.3329/jbcps.v38i0.47446
Moura, M., & Neves, R. (2025). Methodology. In M. Moura & R. Neves, Using Fundamental Analysis and an Ensemble of Classifier Models Along with a Risk-Off Filter to Select Outperforming Companies (pp. 27–52). Springer Nature Switzerland. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-62061-4_3
Platania, S., Morando, M., Caruso, A., & Scuderi, V. E. (2022). The Effect of Psychosocial Safety Climate on Engagement and Psychological Distress: A Multilevel Study on the Healthcare Sector. Safety, 8(3), 62. https://doi.org/10.3390/safety8030062
Podder, L., Alisha, & Bhardwaj, G. (2022). Insulating frontline COVID warriors from moral and mental distress during COVID pandemic- An Evidence based review. Nursing Journal of India, CXIII(01), 03–09. https://doi.org/10.48029/NJI.2022.CXIII101
Rutherford, K., Hiseler, L., & O’Hagan, F. (2023). Help! I need somebody: Help-seeking among workers with work-related mental disorders. In Review. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-2440139/v1
Smith, H., Zhang, S., Jones, A., Dorrington, S., Winter, H., & Beck, A. (2022). Staff support in a National Health Service mental health trust in response to the COVID-19 pandemic: Qualitative study. BJPsych Open, 8(2), e49. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjo.2022.12
Sun, J., Sarfraz, M., Ivascu, L., Iqbal, K., & Mansoor, A. (2022). How Did Work-Related Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Hamper Healthcare Employee Performance during COVID-19? The Mediating Role of Job Burnout and Mental Health. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19(16), 10359. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph191610359
Wulf, I. C. (2022). Help-Seeking and Help-Outreach Intentions of Healthcare Workers—The Role of Mental Health Literacy and Stigma in the Workplace. Frontiers in Education, 7, 856458. https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2022.856458
Zaman, Z., Shanjabin, S., & Islam, S. A. (2023). Impact of Occupational Hazards on Healthcare Professionals’ Mental (Psychological) Health: Evidence from Government-Owned Hospitals in Khulna, Bangladesh. International Journal of Human Resource Studies, 13(1). https://doi.org/10.5296/ijhrs.v13i1.20492
Zhang, Y., & Chen, X. (2022). Methodology. In Y. Zhang & X. Chen, Application-Oriented Higher Education (pp. 83–110). Springer Nature Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-2647-1_6
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Md Amjad Hossain Chowdhury, Sujan Ahmed, Samia Akter Bristy, Mehedee Hasan, Israt Jahan Dipty, Md. Majedul Islam, Syeda Sumaiya, Nuren D. Dihan
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
