‘The Pitt’ and Noah Wyle highlight the need to help doctors and nurses

Fans of ‘The Pitt’ have lauded the hospital drama for its accurate portrayal of emergency medicine, but the show is also winning high praise for prompting more discussions of the mental health of clinicians.

Noah Wyle, the show’s star and executive producer, traveled to Washington, D.C. last month to talk with lawmakers about reauthorizing the Dr. Lorna Breen Health Care Provider Protection Reauthorization Act. The measure helps direct funds to improve the mental health of healthcare workers, and its named for an emergency physician who died by suicide in 2020 during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes’ Foundation thanked Wyle for “elevating these vital voices, pushing for this critical legislation, and helping bring about a world in which seeking help in healthcare is safe, encouraged, and supported, not stigmatized.”

Wyle also wrote about the need to reauthorize the Lorna Breen Act in an op-ed for USA Today last month.

“Our message is simple: Without a supported, protected and fairly treated workforce, there is no patient care. Whatever other important issues are being debated, this has to be a priority,” Wyle wrote.

• Read more: ‘The Pitt’ scores 13 Emmy nominations, and a Pittsburgh hospital played a key role

Staff at Allegheny General Hospital have also advised the producers on the realities of an emergency department, and some scenes of the show have been filmed at the hospital.

Dan Laurent, senior vice president of corporate communications at Highmark Health, says the organization is grateful for “The Pitt” showing the difficult work of emergency medicine and how it can affect clinicians. He says it’s “extremely important” to see Noah Wyle raising those issues.

“The emergency department is a really unique setting for care, and it takes a certain kind of caregiver who wants to work in that setting, and can excel in that setting,” Laurent says. (See more of our conversation in this video. The story continues below.)

The Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes’ Foundation has been pushing hospitals and state licensing boards to drop invasive questions about mental health from their applications. And the foundation’s efforts have found plenty of success in recent years. Hundreds of hospitals and the majority of state medical boards have dropped those questions.

Stefanie Simmons, MD, chief medical officer of the Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes’ Foundation, told Chief Healthcare Executive® that the success is encouraging. But there is more work to be done, she says, as too many doctors and nurses don’t seek assistance for their mental health needs because they’re worried they will have to disclose it.

“We want patients to have safe care, and we want health care workers to have access to mental health care, because a healthy, thriving workforce in health care really begets patient safety and patient care,” Simmons says.

• Read more: Protecting the mental health of young clinicians

The Allegheny Health Network has worked to help its clinicians, Laurent says. He says there has been a “real intense focus” on clinician wellness in recent years.

“We established a clinician wellness program in our organization, and now it's a very robust program,” Laurent says.

He says it’s very important “in light of the challenges that emerged throughout the pandemic and just the day-to-day, the stresses of providing care, particularly at every hospital, but particularly in a large urban setting trauma center like Allegheny General Hospital.”

Dr. Tom Campbell, who leads the health system’s clinician wellness program, previously served as Allegheny’s chairman of emergency medicine, so he’s very familiar with the stress of the trauma environment, Laurent says.

Laurent says the work that Noah Wyle is doing to advocate for the mental health of clinicians “is very much appreciated.”

“We all realize that you can't provide great care unless we're taking care of the people who are providing that care,” Laurent says.

Getting help

988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline: Dial or text 988 to connect with someone. Help is available 24/7.

The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention offers resources for healthcare professionals.

NAMI: The National Alliance for Mental Illness offers “frontline wellness” resources for healthcare workers and public safety employees.