Healthcare employee benefits: what staff want and where employers fall short

Your healthcare workforce spends its days looking after other people. New research from Epassi suggests many of them have little left over to look after themselves. 

We worked with independent research agency Opinium to survey 2,000 UK employees in June 2026, and the healthcare findings should interest anyone who designs reward and benefits. Staff want health and wellbeing support, they say benefits matter more in the current economic climate, and a lot of them cannot say what their employer offers. 

Here is what the data shows and what HR and reward teams can do about it. 

Work/life balance is slipping, and many staff stay quiet about it

A third (32%) of healthcare employees say they are not satisfied with their work/life balance. Two other findings make that harder to fix: 

• 45% do not feel comfortable raising wellbeing concerns at work.

• 23% work beyond their contracted hours at least multiple times a week.

Read those together. Nearly half your people may be struggling without telling you, and almost a quarter regularly give extra hours. Your engagement survey may not pick this up, because the people who feel unable to speak up are the same people least likely to flag it. 

Benefits give them a route that does not require a difficult conversation. Confidential support, flexible options and wellbeing days let someone get help without announcing a problem.

Shift work makes fitness harder, and gym prices make it worse

Fitness is where the research gets specific. Staying active is one of the most effective ways to protect wellbeing, and healthcare staff face two barriers to it: 

• 32% say their work schedule is too tiring for them to get the exercise they need.

• 22% say gym memberships and classes are too expensive.

The first barrier is about energy and time. The second is about cost. Both are things an employer can influence. Discounted gym memberships, flexible class options and digital workouts that fit around rotas and night shifts all lower the effort and the price of getting started. 

The demand is there. Discounted gym membership is the second most popular benefit in the survey (19%), just behind private medical insurance (22%). If you want to build a fitness benefit that people use, design it for tired people on irregular hours. A gym that only works for a 9 to 5 schedule will not reach the staff who need it most. 

What healthcare professionals say they want 

View our Healthcare one-pager to find out which benefits employees want most to support their wellbeing.  

The spread is quite narrow. No single benefit wins outright, which tells you that a one-size package will miss a large part of your workforce. Choice and personalisation matter. 

Benefits now influence who stays and who goes

Healthcare is already a tough labour market, and the research shows benefits sit close to the centre of retention: 

• 65% say the current economic climate has made workplace benefits more important than ever.
• 58% would leave for another employer offering a better salary.
• 46% would move for a better benefits package.
• 33% say a good benefits package is one of the most important things they look for in a role.

Salary still carries the most weight, but nearly half of healthcare professionals would move for benefits alone. For employers who cannot always compete on pay, that gap is an opening. 

The engagement gap: you may already be paying for benefits nobody uses

This finding matters most for reward teams. Healthcare employers are offering benefits, but staff do not know about them or use them:

• Only 52% know exactly what benefits their employer offers, against a 59% average across all sectors.

• Just 24% use the full range available to them.

• Only 33% believe they get good value for money from their benefits package.

If two thirds of your people do not see the value, the issue may be communication and access rather than the benefits themselves. A strong fitness offer does nothing for the shift worker who has never heard of it.

Five steps for HR and reward teams

1. Audit awareness before adding benefits. Ask staff what they know about your current package. If fewer than six in ten can name what they have, fix that first.

2. Build wellbeing support that suits shift patterns. Check that fitness, mental health and flexible working options work for night staff, part-timers and people on rotas.
3. Reduce the cost barrier to fitness. Subsidised memberships and a range of activity types give people a reason to start, whatever their budget and energy levels.
4. Give people a safe way to ask for help. With 45% reluctant to raise wellbeing concerns, offer confidential and self-serve routes alongside manager conversations.
5. Communicate in the places staff already look. Use one platform, regular reminders and short messages. Repeat them, because awareness builds slowly.

The full set of findings, including the engagement figures and the benefits ranking, is in our healthcare one pager. It works as a quick briefing for your next reward review or wellbeing planning session. 

Check out the healthcare one pager.

Want to see how Epassi UK helps healthcare employers boost health and wellbeing? Chat with us now. 

Research conducted by Opinium, which surveyed 2,000 UK employees weighted to be nationally representative, between 11th and 22nd June 2026.