Emotional and Behavioral disturbances create problems in everyday life activities and affect both intrapersonal and interpersonal relationships. Such disturbances could manifest cognitively as in forgetfulness, short attention span and negative thoughts and also impact negatively on work output of workers. The study was conducted to assess the impact of emotional and behavioural disturbances on the work output of health workers at Father Thomas Alan Rooney Memorial Hospital, Asankrangwa in the Western Region of Ghana. The Study adopted a survey study design using purposive and convenience random techniques with a sample size of 50 respondents. The data were gathered using structured questionnaire. Quantitative data analysis methods were used with the aid of SPSS version 21.0
The study found that majority of the respondents have ever had emotional disturbances at work and that emotional disturbances that occurred at home had the propensity to affect work output of health workers. The causes of emotional disturbances at the work place were identified to be workload and stress, poor management, lack of motivation, poor remuneration, mood swing and personality type, work related conflicts and insecurity. The causes of such problems at home were discovered to be relationship and marital issues, disappointments, financial problems, loss of a loved one, family issues. Emotional and behavioural disturbances could lead to lower quality of care and professional satisfaction, difficulty concentrating at work, ineffectual job performance, poor customer care, problems in work relationships, decreased interest or involvement in work, decline in dependability, frequent late arrivals.
The study recommends that a Counselling Psychologist be employed to help deal with emotional disturbances in the work place. It was also recommended that there should be periodic mental health screening programmes for the staff of the hospital and also strong psychological support systems be put in place.
