President Biden Signs Dr. Lorna Breen Act Into Law

New law is a major victory in healthcare workers’ health and well-being.

Legislation that earmarks funding to provide mental health wellness to frontline healthcare workers has been signed into law by President Joe Biden—a move celebrated by the Emergency Nurses Association.

The Dr. Lorna Breen Health Care Provider Protection Act's provisions include, among other things:

• Establishing grants for training healthcare professionals on ways to reduce and prevent suicide, burnout, substance abuse, and other mental health conditions.
• Grant funding for employee education, peer support programming, and behavioral health treatment
• Creation of a national education and awareness campaign focused on encouraging healthcare workers to seek support and treatment.

"This is a major legislative victory for ENA and a major milestone for all healthcare workers, particularly emergency nurses who have endured so much over the last two years,” said ENA President Jennifer Schmitz, MSN, EMT-P, CEN, CPEN, CNML, FNP-C, NE-BC.

"As importantly, this bill's signing signals to everyone that it is OK to speak up, it is OK to seek help, it is OK to prioritize your self-care instead of suffering in silence," Schmitz says. "Lives will be saved because of the help this new law provides to healthcare workers."

The bill, which received bipartisan support, was named for Breen, a physician at New York Presbyterian Hospital in Manhattan, who died by suicide on April 26, 2020, after working around the clock for weeks to treat COVID-19 patients.

She declined getting help for the stress and burnout she was experiencing because she feared seeking mental health help would end the only career she ever wanted and that she would be ostracized by her colleagues, according to the foundation established in her name.