Nearly 300 doctors a year die by suicide. That’s a million patients losing their doctors every year. Beyond the horrific numbers are the human stories. In this article, we reference a physician suicide register that collected details of our lost colleagues.
We remember the human beings — physicians, bright, dedicated, loved and loving, yet still human — who died by suicide.
As a psychiatrist, it took me only a few years in practice to realise that everyone needs a therapist (at least once in their lives). Doctors, nurses, and all healthcare practitioners (HCPs) are no different.
At a recent Physicians Anonymous meeting, we discussed an article on random acts of kindness. Researchers gave 84 random people in a wintry Chicago park free hot chocolates. They were then given the choice to gift it to another or keep it for themselves. Guess what happened?
Women physicians still face disproportionate challenges within their medical careers compared to men. Unsurprisingly, those women who face more work-related stressors report less satisfaction with their careers, and more burnout occurs in female doctors.
This blog explores the science of gratitude for physicians, how it may tackle burnout, and gives some suggestions for gratitude practice.
In a previous article, we explored the evidence base for gratitude. In this article, we illustrate 7 physician gratitude practices that may help on a level. We also note that no one intervention is a panacea for the core systemic issues causing the current epidemic of physician burnout and moral injury.
Imagine a world where no doctor needed to fear sanctions or discrimination for struggling mentally, particularly when the modern practice of medicine is so fraught with conditions causing moral distress. Here’s how to normalize physician mental health.
ED Doctor’s Burnout Story
ED Doctor’s Burnout Story
This article explores how we can solve physician burnout by changing the toxic healthcare system while also providing physicians with tools to help them recognize and treat burnout and other mental health challenges.
Here we have curated a series of validated questionnaires that will at least assist you in screening the commonest psychological problems in doctors, including physician burnout tests, depression tests, and scales for self-compassion and moral injury.
UK doctor burnout has been impacted by the pandemic, too. This article explores the UK situation with particular reference to doctors working in the UK’s National Health Service (NHS).
Long before the COVID pandemic, doctors across the world were suffering from ‘a pandemic of physician burnout’. In this article, we explore global physician burnout statistics and root causes from around the world.
This article discusses physician mental health stigma and explores ways to overcome this unnecessary barrier to getting help.
Burnout in Chinese Doctors is higher than in the West. Physicians Anonymous provides anonymity and safety for doctors to tackle burnout.
Emerging evidence supports an increasingly robust link between physician burnout and medical error. This article explores the evidence between physician burnout and medical error, and the impact on patients.
In this article, we illustrate how physician burnout has been worsened by the Covid-19 pandemic, against a background of already high levels of physician distress.
The idea of physicians boosting their own resilience seems reasonable – at least as this relates to the personal resilience required for being a doctor. Here we present a number of physician resilience programs designed by doctors
The idea of physicians boosting their own resilience seems reasonable – at least as this relates to the personal resilience required for being a doctor. Here we summarize the evidence base of interventions for physician resilience
If there’s one good thing about a pandemic, it’s increased public awareness of their healthcare workers as human beings under stress. In this article, we have pulled together a number of resources for physician resilience developed by professional organizations for the interested physician reader and physician leader.
Let’s talk about physician wellbeing in the COVID era. Burnout and depression are still serious problems among physicians, especially amid COVID-19. The 2021 Medscape National Physician Burnout and Suicide Report makes for disturbing reading. More than 12,000 doctors across 29 specialties responded to the anonymous survey which ran from August to December 2020.
