Does a physician's use of vacation days, along with doing work while away, have an impact on burnout? Researchers attempted to answer those questions in a new analysis published Friday in JAMA Network Open.
Radiologists were on the higher end of those taking more than three weeks of paid leave in a year, at 74.8% (based on 86 responses). Anesthesiologists were the only specialty with a higher rate (75.6%, 93), while radiation oncologists came in third (62.5%, 20). On the other end, family medicine had the lowest proportion of docs taking three or more weeks (34.4%, 77), followed by physical medicine and rehabilitation (32.8%, 22) and general internal medicine (27.2%, 56)
Lead author Christine A. Sinsky, MD, and colleagues also explored which specialties performed patient-related tasks while on their vacations. Emergency medicine (19.5%, 34) and radiology (20%, 23) had the lowest percentage of physicians performing 30 minutes or more of work on vacation. Urology (55%, 11) and neurology (43.3%, 39) had the highest.
Across all 3,024 U.S. physicians surveyed, 59.6% took three weeks of vacation or fewer per year, and 70.4% worked while on a typical vacation day. Both of these findings were associated with higher rates of burnout, the authors highlighted.
“These findings suggest that support for taking vacation and efforts to reduce physicians’ obligations to perform patient care-related tasks while on vacation, such as providing full electronic health record inbox coverage, should be considered to prevent physician burnout,” Sinsky, VP of professional satisfaction with the American Medical Association, and colleagues concluded.
Researchers administered the survey to physicians between November 2020 and March 2021. They measured burnout using the Maslach Burnout Index and professional fulfillment via the Stanford Professional Fulfillment Index. Overall, 33.1% of physicians worked 30 minutes or more on a vacation day. Concern about finding someone to cover clinical responsibilities and financial worries were both associated with decreased likelihood of taking more than three weeks away. And taking more than three weeks of vacation per year and having full EHR inbox coverage while on vacation were both tied to lower rates of burnout. On the other side, spending 30 minutes or more on patient-related work while vacationing was associated with higher rates of burnout.
“Normalizing the expectation that physicians take time off and fully disconnect from clinical work while away may also be beneficial at both the organizational and professional level. Such efforts may be critical and tangible system-based approaches to mitigate the high rates of occupational burnout among physicians,” the authors advised.
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Marty Stempniak has covered healthcare since 2012, with his byline appearing in the American Hospital Association's member magazine, Modern Healthcare and McKnight's. Prior to that, he wrote about village government and local business for his hometown newspaper in Oak Park, Illinois. He won a Peter Lisagor and Gold EXCEL awards in 2017 for his coverage of the opioid epidemic.