News: National Academy of Medicine publishes strategies for reducing physician burnout

A new report from the National Academy of Medicine says that between one-third and one-half of U.S. clinicians experience burnout, Credentialing Resource Center reported.

Emotional exhaustion, detachment, and a low sense of personal accomplishment caused by burnout can jeopardize patient care and cause healthcare providers to leave the profession altogether. Burnout is often caused by lengthy work hours, technologies and documentation requirements, insufficient resources, and an inability to find a healthy work-life balance.

In their report, the National Academy of Medicine outlines six strategies healthcare systems can use to address these contributing factors and reduce physician burnout:

1. Create a positive work environment that prioritizes high-quality care, job satisfaction, and social support
2. Have medical school reduce student stress by monitoring workloads, implementing pass-fail grading, and providing better access to scholarships and affordable loans
3. Get rid of regulations and policies that don’t improve patient care but contribute to clinician burnout
4. Create more user-friendly and intuitive EHRs
5. Improve burnout recovery services while keeping information from being admissible in malpractice litigation to reduce the stigma of getting help
6. Create a coordinated research agenda for clinician burnout among federal agencies by the end of 2020 to identify burnout drivers, the consequences of burnout to the workforce and patient safety, and systems-level interventions to improve clinician well-being

Editor’s note: This story originally appeared in Credentialing Resource Center. The National Academies story can be found here.