Page 42 - Delaware Medical Journal - July-August 2018
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BURNOUT:
What Causes it, How You Can Spot it in Yourself and Others, and What to Do Next
Tina Irgang Leaderman
One of the most important survival skills for physicians is being able to step back from emotions during high-stakes, high-stress situations. But that same skill can turn into interacting with friends and colleagues.
It’s one of the many reasons physician burnout has become something of a national epidemic. While individual surveys disagree on the exact percentage of physicians who have experienced burnout, all agree that it’s a widespread problem. What’s more, it’s a problem that’s on the rise.
A 2017 Medscape survey, for example, found that 60 percent of emergency-medicine practitioners are
problem in emergency medicine. A pair of studies conducted by the Mayo Clinic and American Medical Association showed burnout rates for all responding physicians at 54 percent in 2014 — up 10 percent from 2011.
“We can be certain that at least 50 percent of physicians exhibit signs of being burned out, and in some specialties of course it’s much higher,” says Patrick Hudson, MD, FACS, BCC,
national consulting practice Coaching for Physicians.
CAUSES OF BURNOUT
Even under the best of circumstances, a physician’s working life is stressful. “We’re with patients and families at the worst times of their lives,” says MSD member Heather
L. Farley, MD, Director of the Center for Provider Wellbeing at Christiana Care.
However, recent changes in
the health care landscape have undoubtedly contributed to making the problem worse. One is the additional workload involved with implementing and maintaining electronic medical records, which many physicians have found takes
up time spent with patients or family. “A recent study shows that for each hour with patients, doctors spend two hours on the computer, many of those late
at night from home,” says Dike Drummond, MD, a former family physician who now coaches and speaks nationwide on the issue of burnout.
Some of the other major causes of physician burnout include:
• The trauma of losing patients or making a medical error — or simply the fear of such an outcome.
214 Del Med J | July/August 2018 | Vol. 90 | No. 6
