Burnout?

[Cerberus]

Anyone have methods of combating burnout? I am having my first experience with it. I work in an incredibly poor, underserved population, who generally take all their frustrations out on me and my staff. I have very poor ancillary services. I have a mix of nurses who are great but as over worked as me or been in the job so long they really don't give a @@@@ anymore. Aside from that, I'm just not feeling that challenged. I'm not cocky and still get humbled from time to time, but I have pretty sound algorithms in place and find that I don't really find the job as challenging as I did when I was fresher... which is making the actual practice more monotonous. I need to spice up this relationship before I lose interest to the point that I need to find something else...

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[tkim]

work less, change jobs

 

[RustedFox]

Yeah, I feel you mang... it's a job. Remember that. How's the pay?

 

[deleted109597]

Move to a job where your work is respected, and the staffing levels are appropriate.

 

[FroggerMD]

Anyone have methods of combating burnout? I am having my first experience with it. I work in an incredibly poor, underserved population, who generally take all their frustrations out on me and my staff. I have very poor ancillary services. I have a mix of nurses who are great but as over worked as me or been in the job so long they really don't give a @@@@ anymore. Aside from that, I'm just not feeling that challenged. I'm not cocky and still get humbled from time to time, but I have pretty sound algorithms in place and find that I don't really find the job as challenging as I did when I was fresher... which is making the actual practice more monotonous. I need to spice up this relationship before I lose interest to the point that I need to find something else...

Get a new job. Seriously. Keep moonlighting at this hospital if you feel a tie to the community but otherwise get a less malignant gig. A good working environment with functional consultants and great ancillary services (plus little things - a starbucks in the lobby, a nice physical space to work in), does WONDERS. Changing up your work environment and working in different settings (small rural hospitals, large trauma centers, maybe somewhere international) will also keep you on your toes and keep you interested. Do it now before you get even more set in your ways.

 

[Tenk]

Time for a new job!

 

[The White Coat Investor]

Anyone have methods of combating burnout? I am having my first experience with it. I work in an incredibly poor, underserved population, who generally take all their frustrations out on me and my staff. I have very poor ancillary services. I have a mix of nurses who are great but as over worked as me or been in the job so long they really don't give a @@@@ anymore. Aside from that, I'm just not feeling that challenged. I'm not cocky and still get humbled from time to time, but I have pretty sound algorithms in place and find that I don't really find the job as challenging as I did when I was fresher... which is making the actual practice more monotonous. I need to spice up this relationship before I lose interest to the point that I need to find something else...

Attack burnout from multiple angles.

#1 Read a book on burnout. I like the one mentioned here: http://whitecoatinvestor.com/using-a-venn-diagram-to-decrease-burnout/
# 2 Become financially independent or at least in a position where you can work less. It's amazing how much more fun EM is when you don't have to do it
# 3 If everyone there is burned out, that's a sign. There are jobs in EM where all the docs and nurses aren't crispy. Consider moving to one.
# 4 There are lots of interesting ways you can reduce burnout without changing jobs or finances. The book talks about lots of them. One interesting one is to have a ritual when you pull into the garage and turn off work and turn on the rest of your life.
# 5 Work. It's so unpleasant they have to pay people to do it. Hate your job? There's a support group for that. It meets on Friday nights down at the bar.

 

[The White Coat Investor]

Oh, and the reason your job now seems boring is because you're competent. It typically happens 7-10 years out of residency after around 40,000 patient encounters. You now rarely see stuff you've never seen before. Start focusing on other things, and play little games at work. Like go into a room determined to get a comment card from the patient no matter what it takes. Or focus each week on something different, like dealing with drug seekers better or whatever. Or really put your focus on learning something from each patient about non-medical stuff. Since you no longer have to worry as much about how to practice good medicine, you can now focus on other stuff.

 

[Birdstrike]

Did someone say, "Burnout"?

 

[GeneralVeers]

Frequent trips to the doctors lounge to raid the sodas/chips also helps greatly.

 

[Fox800]

Did someone say, "Burnout"?

Birdstrike be like

 

[MSmentor018]

Walk away from your desk and the treatment area for a few minutes, take a sanity walk… A lot of sanity walks
you got to have an outlet. come down to Florida, there's so much to do medicine would just be a way to pay for your hobbies!

 

[Arcan57]

Like WCI said, find the metagame that keeps things interesting. It can be something career defining such as an academician's area of focus. We've all had the attending with a neuro bent who was never more than one symptom away from tying the patient's condition to a CNS issue. It can be something less obvious like getting out on time without pissing off the oncoming doc or seeing how many times you can turn over a room during a shift. The key is it needs to be something you can connect with on a genuine level. I used to carry a piece of paper (usually a pathology request form which were omnipresent in our ED for some reason) folded into quarters and would place pt labels as a personal tracking board. 8 labels placed horizontally in 2 columns of 4 would perfectly fit each panel. I felt that I had accomplished something when I x'ed off the third panel and that I was an absolute beast if I had to unfold the paper and start using the fresh side. The feeling of accomplishment got me through some pretty crap shifts. Of course, if admin told me I had to see a min. of 24 pts and that I lost 15% of my income if I didn't see at least 32 it wouldn't have had the same effect.

I don't think the Maslach's scale works terribly well for the ED since the very nature of our job predisposes to high levels of depersonalization and emotional exhaustion. I recently heard a talk where they focused on job satisfaction deriving from a triad of: autonomy, mastery, and purpose. At least personally, that rings more true with my relation to being burned out in the ED as it gives me things I can directly effect rather than some nebulous concept of improved emotional health or getting more rest.