Abstract
Background
Burnout in medicine, and specifically radiology, has been receiving more attention. Little data-driven literature is available regarding risk factors/causes to ultimately help guide the development of potential solutions.
Objective
To survey pediatric radiologists, a cohort with a documented high prevalence of burnout, and to understand the impact of clinical demands on nonclinical tasks and the implications of burnout on mental health.
Materials and methods
A survey of Society for Pediatric Radiology (SPR) North America attendings was performed regarding institutional factors contributing to burnout, including call burden, clinical demands, departmental support and administrative/academic tasks. Questions regarding mental health and wellness resources were also included. Generalized linear modeling assuming binomial distribution was used for analyses with SAS 9.4.
Results
The response rate was 305/1,282 (24%) with 53% of respondents female. Respondents reported that both the number and complexity of clinical cases have increased since they first started practice as an attending, while the time for interpretation has not changed, P<0.0001. Using a scale of 0 (never), 1 (rarely), 2 (sometimes), 3 (frequently) and 4 (always), covering multiple hospitals (2.2) and administrative tasks (2.4) were the most stressful job factors. For those in administrative roles, the most stressful job factors were job-related tasks affected teaching duties (2.0) and decreased overall job satisfaction (2.0). Of the respondents, 52% said they know a physician affected by work stress-related mental illness and 25% know a physician who has contemplated or committed suicide. While 39% of the respondents have resources available to address burnout, only 33% utilize these resources.
Conclusion
Increasing clinical demands and additional institutional/departmental factors play a potential role in burnout, which has serious implications for the mental health of pediatric radiologists.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Maslach C, Jackson SE (1981) The measurement of experienced burnout. J Occup Behav 2:99–113
Shanafelt TD, Hasan O, Dyrbye LN et al (2015) Changes in burnout and satisfaction with work-life balance in physicians and the general US working population between 2011 and 2014. Mayo Clin Proc 90:1600–1613
Kane L (2019) Medscape national physician burnout, depression & suicide report 2019. https://www.medscape.com/slideshow/2019-lifestyle-burnout-depression-6011056. Accessed 21 December 2019
Shanafelt TD, Boone S, Tan L et al (2012) Burnout and satisfaction with work-life balance among US physicians relative to the general US population. Arch Intern Med 172:1377–1385
Ramirez AJ, Graham J, Richards MA et al (1996) Mental health of hospital consultants: the effects of stress and satisfaction at work. Lancet 347:724–728
Brown SD, Goske MJ, Johnson CM (2009) Beyond substance abuse: stress, burnout, and depression as causes of physician impairment and disruptive behavior. J Am Coll Radiol 6:479–485
Tawfik DS, Profit J, Morgenthaler TI et al (2018) Physician burnout, well-being, and work unit safety grades in relationship to reported medical errors. Mayo Clin Proc 93:1571–1580
Han S, Shanafelt TD, Sinsky CA et al (2019) Estimating the attributable cost of physician burnout in the United States. Ann Intern Med 170:784–790
Chew FS, Mulcahy MJ, Porrino JA et al (2017) Prevalence of burnout among musculoskeletal radiologists. Skeletal Radiol 46:497–506
Ayyala RS, Ahmed FS, Ruzal-Shapiro C, Taylor GA (2018) Prevalence of burnout among pediatric radiologists. J Am Coll Radiol 16:518–522
Parikh J, Sun J, Mainiero M (2020) Prevalence of burnout in breast imaging radiologists. J Breast Imaging 2:112–118
Ayyala RS, Ahmed FS, Ruzal-Shapiro C, Taylor G (2019) Stressors contributing to burnout amongst pediatric radiologists: results from a survey of the Society for Pediatric Radiology. Pediatr Radiol 49:714–722
Harolds JA, Parikh JR, Bluth EI et al (2016) Burnout of radiologists: frequency, risk factors, and remedies: a report of the ACR Commission on human resources. J Am Coll Radiol 13:411–416
Chetlen AL, Chan TL, Ballard DH et al (2019) Addressing burnout in radiologists. Acad Radiol 26:526–533
Kruskal JB, Shanafelt T, Eby P et al (2019) A road map to foster wellness and engagement in our workplace—a report of the 2018 summer intersociety meeting. J Am Coll Radiol 16:869–877
Chen JY, Lexa FJ (2017) Baseline survey of the neuroradiology work environment in the United States with reported trends in clinical work, nonclinical work, perceptions of trainees, and burnout metrics. AJNR Am J Neuroradiol 38:1284–1291
Jha AK, Li KT, Williams MA et al (n.d.) A crisis in health care: a call to action on physician burnout. https://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/21/2019/01/PhysicianBurnoutReport2018FINAL.pdf. Accessed 3 June 2019
World Health Organization (2019) Burnout an “occupational phenomenon”: International Classification of Disease. https://www.who.int/mental_health/evidence/burn-out/en/. Accessed 6 April 2019
Shanafelt TD, Dyrbye LN, Sinsky C et al (2016) Relationship between clerical burden and characteristics of the electronic environment with physician burnout and professional satisfaction. Mayo Clin Proc 91:836–848
Lim KJ, Yoon DY, Yun EJ et al (2012) Characteristics and trends of radiology research: a survey of original articles published in AJR and radiology between 2001 and 2010. Radiology 264:796–802
Merewitz L, Sunshine JH (2006) A portrait of pediatric radiologists in the United States. AJR Am J Roentgenol 186:12–22
Arnold RW, Goske MJ, Bulas DI et al (2009) Factors influencing subspecialty choice among radiology residents: a case study of pediatric radiology. J Am Coll Radiol 6:635–642
Pfeifer CM (2018) Declining interest in pediatric radiology prompts a call to sction. J Am Coll Radiol 15:490–492
Fishman MDC, Mehta TS, Siewert B et al (2018) The road to wellness: engagement strategies to help radiologists achieve joy at work. Radiographics 38:1651–1664
Duarte D, El-Hagrassy MM, Couto TCE et al (2020) Male and female physician suicidality: a systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Psychiatry. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2020.0011
American College of Radiology (2020) Radiology well-being program. https://www.acr.org/Member-Resources/Benefits/Well-Being. Accessed 21 March 2020
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflicts of interest
None
Additional information
Publisher’s note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Electronic supplementary material
ESM 1
(DOCX 13980 kb)
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Ayyala, R.S., Baird, G.L., Sze, R.W. et al. The growing issue of burnout in radiology — a survey-based evaluation of driving factors and potential impacts in pediatric radiologists. Pediatr Radiol 50, 1071–1077 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00247-020-04693-2
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00247-020-04693-2