Physician Burnout: Why We Should All Care, and What We Are Doing About It

Recent studies are showing disturbing trends among physicians: roughly four out of five physicians feel overworked, roughly 1/3 are retiring early or considering doing so, and roughly three out of five are considering switching careers and leaving the practice of medicine. Burnout among nurses is likewise occurring at a staggering rate.

Productivity pressures, endless laborious, inefficient charting, insurance forms to complete and denials to fight, having to make frequent adjustments and compromises due to constantly medication formulary insurance coverage changes, consoling frustrated patients, stagnating real wages, ever-increasing recertification exams to take and other training requirements to meet, and high staff turnover, shortages, and long clinical work hours as well as too-short clinic visit time-slots that leave both patient and physician frustrated all contribute to a sense of overwhelming loss of control, with reduced professional fulfillment and enjoyment.

This trend and these factors contributing to it should concern us all, because every one of us is a patient, and when physicians and nurses are in short supply and are buckling under and leaving the profession due to increasingly impossible pressures, the quality of our healthcare itself is at risk. Overworked physicians and nurses are more prone to make mistakes, and mistakes degrade patient care quality - and even cause patient harm.

There is no easy fix to the problems causing physician and nurse burnout, but there is something concerned patients can do to reduce their risk of being harmed by, or less than optimally treated due to, the phenomenon of physician and nurse burnout.  

By seeking help and advice from healthcare providers who are not under undue time pressure, and whose practice encourages them to formulate and communicate their expert opinions to patients and their care providers thoroughly, thoughtfully, and only after considering as much relevant background information as possible, patients can take back some degree of control.

At MD For Patients, we strive to maintain a practice environment that provides this culture of care for our physicians and nurses. We encourage them to take the time necessary to understand and address patients’ questions and concerns completely, and to assess their histories and existing test results thoroughly, without undue time pressure.

This is how our experts can best form the most accurate diagnoses and opinions possible.  

Our experts then take the time needed to explain their opinions thoroughly to patients and their care providers. Moreover, we remain available to our patients as their care progresses and additional information becomes available and additional questions arise.  

We want our patients to rest assured that the effort we put into understanding what happened with them medically before we became involved in their care will not be lost, but that instead it will be put to good use, to assure that they will receive even better care going forward.

Our expert consultants prefer this approach to the hurried, productivity-driven reimbursement models so prevalent in modern medicine. We know that to take a rushed approach to medical care would be neither satisfying nor healthy for us as physicians - nor would it be healthy for patients.

At MD For Patients, we choose to do better - so that both we and our patients will be around for the long haul.