The Impact of Physician Burnout

Physician burnout is a long-term stress reaction characterized by emotional exhaustion, depersonalization (indifference toward or detachment from work), and a decreased sense of personal achievement. Physicians are especially prone to burnout with almost half of physicians reporting at least one symptom of burnout.

Causes and Effects of Burnout
Physician burnout not only negatively affects physicians and their families, but it also puts patients at risk. Evidence suggests that physician burnout worsens the quality of patient care, increases the risk of medical errors, and decreases patient satisfaction.

Excessive workload, high patient volumes, administrative and regulatory burdens, increased documentation requirements, limited control over work schedules, and lack of support and autonomy from their organizations have been shown to increase physician stress levels and lead to a lack of work-life balance, emotional exhaustion, and poor relationships with colleagues and patients. This all creates burnout.

Steps You Can Take to Prevent Burnout
Here are some steps you can take at your practice to help reduce stress and prevent burnout:

• Identify opportunities to eliminate unnecessary processes and protocols.
• Solicit ideas from other physicians and office staff for eliminating unnecessary tasks.
• Revise scheduling protocols to allow extra time for new patient visits and existing patient visits needing additional time, to allow time for urgent same day visits, and to allow for scheduling timely follow-up visits.
• Work with your EHR vendor to add technologies that make workflows more efficient, improve interoperability, and give staff more time to focus on the delivery of quality care.
• Share the workload with other staff members, as appropriate, by creating team-based care workflows.

Some factors contributing to burnout may be out of your control if you work in a large organization. You can impact this by communicating with upper management current practices leading to physician burnout and advocating for organizational-level solutions to mitigate burnout. Other measures physicians can take to care of themselves and help avoid burnout include:

• Eating a healthy diet
• Developing healthy relationships with colleagues
• Getting enough sleep
• Mindfulness practices
• Exercising
• Staying hydrated
• Maximizing the amount of time you spend on things you enjoy
• Minimizing the time you spend on things you do not enjoy
• Seeking support from a doctor or mental health professional 

You may not be able to fix systemic issues alone, but joining hospital committees, professional networks, or advocacy groups can provide a sense of agency.

Additional Resources
There are many resources available online that address physician burnout and offer guidance for implementing mitigation strategies. Here are just a few:

• U.S. Department of Health and Human Services - Workplace Mental Health & Well-Being
• Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality - Physician Burnout
• American Medical Association - Practice innovation strategies: Physician burnout
• American Academy of Family Physicians - Physician Burnout: Its Origin, Symptoms, and Five Main Causes
• Massachusetts Medical Society, Massachusetts Health and Hospital Association, Harvard T.H. Chan School of  Public Health, and Harvard Global Health Institute - A Crisis in Health Care: A Call to Action on Physician Burnout
• National Library of Medicine - Physician Burnout: Evidence-Based Roadmaps to Prioritizing and Supporting Personal Wellbeing

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