Physician burnout and healthcare epidemiology: Dual implications worthy of greater scrutiny

• Published in: Infection control and hospital epidemiology 2020-02, Vol.41 (2), p.250-2
• Main Authors: Bearman, Gonzalo, Hota, Susy S, Haessler, Sarah D
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antibiotics; Burnout; Burnout, Professional; Clinical decision making; Cross Infection - epidemiology; Data collection; Disease prevention; Epidemiology; Executives; Health care; Hospitals; Humans; Infectious diseases; Medical personnel; Medicine; Monetary incentives; Nosocomial infections; Patient Safety; Pay for performance; Physicians; Physicians - psychology; Population; Prevention programs; Quality of Health Care; Safety programs; Systematic review; Workers
• ISSN: 0899-823X; 1559-6834
• DOI: 10.1017/ice.2019.348

A 2016 survey of 16,000 physicians in the United States reported an average burnout rate ranging from 40% to 55%.1 The prevalence of burnout varies based on physician characteristics, years in practice, age, gender and specialty.2 In infectious diseases, burnout was reported by 53% of respondents in a recent survey, and important drivers included inadequate compensation and lack of support staff for maximum productivity in job-specific roles.3 No published reports on the drivers and consequences of burnout in healthcare epidemiology are available. Increasing emphasis is now placed on the stewardship of testing, to minimize both overtesting and false-positive diagnosis.8 To achieve greater fidelity in test stewardship, programs are turning to the electronic medical record (EMR) as a point-of-care decision-support tool with forcing functions and hard stops.9 EMR decision support is also utilized as a facet of antimicrobial stewardship.8 Most physicians have a love–hate relationship with the EMR.10 The most frequently reported concerns related to the EMR include increased time devoted to nonclinical tasks, less efficient workflow, negative effects on interpersonal relationships, and decreased quality of care.2 For many, the EMR is a drain on physician satisfaction that is implemented broadly for greater efficiency, data collection, cost saving, and reductions in medical errors, yet with the significant failure to anticipate the negative downstream effects on workflow overload, meaningfulness, value, and burnout.11 The incremental impact on burnout of EMR utilization for infection prevention is not known and is worthy of further study. [...]physician burnout is pervasive and the infectious diseases field is no different, with >50% of infectious diseases specialists reporting burnout.