Almost one in three health service workers have admitted that they would not be happy with the standard of care available if a loved one required treatment.

Furthermore, according to the results of a major new survey, one-third of health service workers are dissatisfied with their jobs and almost one in five find it difficult to stay motivated.

The first health sector employee engagement survey has been carried out by the HSE. It set out to discover the views and opinions of employees working in the Irish health service.

Over 8,600 people responded between September and November of last year, the vast majority of whom worked in the HSE. Most worked full-time and almost half had been working in the health service for at least 16 years.

The survey found that 52% of workers were ‘fairly' or ‘very satisfied' with their jobs, however, 33% were ‘fairly' or ‘very dissatisfied'.

While 27% of workers said they were ‘very motivated' and ‘always enthusiastic' about their job, 19% had low levels of motivation and 9% admitted that they are ‘rarely' or ‘never' enthusiastic about their job.

Just over half (55%) of workers said they were happy in their jobs, but almost one in four (23%) disagreed with this, while 17% said they ‘rarely' or ‘never' look forward to going to work.

Most of the respondents were full-time workers, i.e. they are contracted to work at least 30 hours per week. The survey found that 31% work additional paid hours, while 57% work additional unpaid hours, with 6% working 11 or more additional unpaid hours every week.

With regard to their roles, almost nine in 10 (89%) felt that their job made a difference to patients and a similar number (86%) felt trusted to do their job.

However, just 29% felt that they were involved in decisions that affected their work and just 26% felt that they had all the equipment, support and resources they needed to carry out their job correctly.

Some 81% believed their job was secure and 75% were satisfied with the support they got from colleagues. However, just 29% were satisfied with their level of pay.

Almost one in five (19%) were ‘very dissatisfied' with their pay.

Meanwhile, the survey also found that 71% of respondents said they hoped to still be working in the health service in two years' time. However when asked whether they would be happy with the standard of care provided if a family member or friend needed treatment, 30% admitted that they would not.

While just over half (53%) of workers said they feel proud to work for the health service, just 16% said they feel valued and recognised by the service.

And when it came to management, just 20% said that senior managers act on staff feedback, while just 12% said they had confidence in decisions made by senior management.

When it came to specific line managers, 23% said that their line managers do not listen to ideas and suggestions and 28% said the managers did not communicate effectively with their teams. Some 35% said their managers did not provide clear feedback about their work.

The survey noted that 36% of workers felt they had not received adequate training for their jobs, while 58% felt that the health service is not good at developing employees to their full potential. Just 16% felt it did manage to do this.

The survey found that some 16% of HSE workers have ‘extremely high' stress levels and 51% have felt unwell as a result of stress in the last 12 months.

The survey also found that in the last month, 38% of staff said they saw some sort of error, near miss or incident at work that could have hurt a member of staff, while 45% saw an error that could have hurt a patient. The vast majority of these errors were reported.

"We have taken the significant step of asking employees across the entire Irish public health services about their experience of working in the health services. This is a first step in a process of listening to the views and opinions of our staff, giving them the opportunity to tell us what it's like for them, so that we can use this information to improve the working lives of staff, ultimately leading to better care for our patients," commented the HSE's national HR director, Ian Tegerdine.

While acknowledging that some of the results are ‘disappointing', he said that this is probably not surprising ‘given that the health service has come through an incredibly challenging few years when there was unprecedented cuts in budgets and staff numbers'.

"This has naturally had a big impact on people working in the services, who work under enormous pressure to deliver a quality service to patients, despite the challenges," he noted.

Mr Tegerdine added that these findings will inform the development of an ‘Action Plan for Employee Engagement' in the health service.

"Focus groups are being held around the country over the coming months to get further detailed input from employee's on key issues highlighted in the survey including, staff uncertainty about the future, improving the connection with senior leadership, improving staff advocacy for services and enhancing internal communications," he added.