October is Australia’s Mental Health Month and an opportunity to bring the country together to raise awareness about mental illness and to promote better mental health. 

One in five Australians will experience mental illness in any given year. 

Forty-five per cent will experience mental illness in their lifetime, while three per cent will experience complex mental illness such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or personality disorders (SANE Australia 2016). 

Suicide is the leading cause of death for Australians aged 25–44. 

On any particular day, six Australians will die by suicide and 30 attempts will be made (Black Dog Institute 2020). 

Mental health of physiotherapists 

Health professionals, including physiotherapists, are not immune to mental illnesses and in some cases are at greater risk of mental illness than the general population. 

Health professionals often put other people’s needs above their own, at the expense of their mental health. 

In addition, they often have poor coping strategies and are reluctant to seek professional help (Braquehais & Vargas-Cáceres 2023). 

Health professionals face significant mental health challenges including burnout and compassion fatigue. 

Compassion fatigue is often triggered by ongoing empathy and the expenditure of emotional energy. 

The people most at risk of compassion fatigue are those with negative life experiences, including depression and anxiety. 

However, it is primarily driven by work-related and organisational structures (Cavanagh et al 2019). 

Mental health of the LGBTQIA+ community 

Members of the LGBTQIA+ community are also more likely to experience mental illness and healthcare providers who are part of the LGBTQIA+ community may therefore experience a compounding effect. 

A 2020 report, ‘Private Lives 3’ (Hill et al 2020), demonstrated that 73.2 per cent of LGBTQIA+ people had been diagnosed with a mental illness, most commonly depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and eating disorders. 

Members of the LGBTQIA+ community attempt suicide at four times the rate of the general population. 

Being part of the LGBTQIA+ community does not mean that this is the cause of being mentally ill. 

Members of the community face minority stress, systemic discrimination and marginalisation. 

Minority stress is ‘the chronic, cumulative stress associated with stigma, due to objective events (such as discrimination and victimization) and psychological responses to these events (such as internalized shame)’ (Meyer 2023 quoted in Diamond & Alley 2022). 

An individual does not have to experience a personal incident of discrimination to encounter minority stress. 

Other contributing factors include internalised queerphobia and fear of rejection. Systemic discrimination, on both a societal and an organisational level, can increase the impact of minority stress. 

As a result of these experiences, members of the LGBTQIA+ community have higher rates of mental illness than the general population. 

Improving mental health

There are many ways to improve mental health and manage mental illness. 

Community—belonging and connectedness are critical to anyone’s wellbeing. 

For members of a minority group, community connections can reduce the negative impacts of minority stress. 

Purpose—a sense of purpose and meaning is also central to wellbeing and for many health professionals it is found at work. 

This makes it all the more important for workplaces to be responsive to issues facing the LGBTQIA+ community and ensure that they are creating a safe environment for LGBTQIA+ employees. 

Inclusive workplaces—by making your workplace inclusive you are ensuring that members of the LGBTQIA+ community feel safe, valued and included. 

This may involve, for example, sharing pronouns in bios or when introducing each other and having gender-neutral bathrooms. 

For more information, see ‘Saying “we’re inclusive” isn’t enough’ by Dr Julie Walters (InMotion, October 2023). 

Mental health advice—seeking the advice of a psychologist, psychiatrist or other mental healthcare professional can improve an individual’s ability to cope with additional life stressors. 

Crisis lines—crisis lines are an important part of mental healthcare. 

Lifeline (13 11 14) and QLife (1800 184 527) are helplines to consider. The latter is specific to the LGBTQIA+ community. 

Overall, LGBTQIA+ healthcare professionals are at increased risk of mental illness and distress—both from being a healthcare professional and from being part of the LGBTQIA+ community. 

The societal and organisational factors that make this group more likely to face mental health challenges must be considered when promoting mental health among physiotherapists. 

Click here for references. 

Holly Shuttleworth APAM (they/them) is a non-binary physiotherapist who works primarily with individuals with connective tissue disorders such as Ehlers-Danlos Syndromes and Hypermobility Spectrum Disorder. They have a special interest in neurodivergence and LGBTQIA+ health.