Burnout In Health Care Workers

Nowadays, there are countless jobs that require contact with other people, especially in healthcare. These jobs require a particularly constant personal contact with the patients. These contacts can also have negative effects. One of the negative effects is burnout among healthcare workers.

Burnout is defined as an emotional reaction to one’s work environment. It has three distinct symptoms: emotional exhaustion, personal distance, and lack of personal commitment.

In that sense, burnout in health care workers can have serious and negative consequences for both the company where the person is employed and for the employee’s own physical and mental health condition.

Burnout affects a wide range of healthcare professionals. Everyone from dietitians, doctors, nurses, pharmacists, psychologists and psychiatrists to family therapists, social workers, marriage counselors and administrative staff can be affected.

How does our mood affect our work?

Our mood has a direct impact on our thoughts and behavior. Our judgment and decisions can be influenced by the mood we are in.

A good mood can make employees feel profitable and enable them to perform tasks and tackle problems effectively. A bad mood can create situations where the professionals do not feel able to handle the job satisfactorily.

Personal problems can create anxiety. This anxiety can eventually affect our work performance negatively. It can also happen even though our problems have nothing to do with work. We may be distracted, have difficulty concentrating, make more mistakes, and so on.

It’s hard to try to concentrate on his work if there are other things to think about. And if your job requires a high degree of concentration, it will just complicate the whole thing even more.

We have a limited ability to focus. Because of this, we will be more affected by sadness and depression when we have to perform tasks that require greater cognitive effort. It only worsens if there are also obsessions that may be due to anxiety or depression.

Burnout in health care workers

The symptoms can vary from person to person, depending on their personal circumstances and the form of the job. But one of the first signs is if it is difficult to get up in the morning, or chronic fatigue.

In addition, burnout in employees has these symptoms:

• Psychosomatic symptoms: Headache, stomach problems, insomnia, palpitations, chronic fatigue, chest pain, high blood pressure, more often colds or allergy-like symptoms.
• Behavioral symptoms: Excessive absence from work, cynicism, apathy, hostility, sarcasm, pessimism, irritation, general anxiety and work-related anxiety.
• Emotional symptoms: Frustration, boredom, emotional distancing, anxiety, impatience, confused and a continuous feeling of impotence.

Factors leading to burnout in employees

Work-related factors can cause burnout in healthcare workers. Healthcare professionals are constantly treating people who are involved in many different things. It is work that requires intense constant or frequent personal contact, which can escalate into stressful situations.

Furthermore, it is people who are passionate about their work, or who are hard on themselves at work, who are most exposed to being burned out in their jobs. Therefore, there are more women than men who experience burnout.

According to Pines, Aronson, and Kafry (1981), the main cause of burnout is occupational triviality. This triviality can create a number of emotional consequences. The reason for these consequences is:

• Type of job: Shifts, plans, stability, security, experience, incorporation of new technology in the company, degree of independence, salary, feedback, etc.
• External and personal characteristics: Low tolerance for error and frustration, high need for control, ambition, impatience or excessive perfectionism and focus on competition.

The three factors of burnout

Through their inventory of burnout (MBI), Maslach and Jackson believe that burnout in health care workers is a combination of three different factors:

• Emotional exhaustion: Exhaustion on an emotional level due to demands on the job.
• Alienation:  A level of indifference and apathy towards society. This often causes employees to feel as if they are looking at themselves from the outside, rather than as active participants.
• Low level of personal satisfaction: A lack of sense of success, satisfaction, independence and self-realization.

However, a diagnosis of burnout often coincides with two other syndromes: depression and chronic fatigue. In recent years, burnout among healthcare workers has also become more common. This change reflects how much more stressed the staff are at work.

To prevent burnout, it is important to understand the extent completely, especially if you work with health. In addition, it is also important to work with various tools that can help us manage burnout. Tools like support and better communication can help us make ourselves more resilient.

On the other hand, companies need to encourage teamwork and supervision around the working conditions in between. They can also hold work days to prevent and manage burnout. It can be useful for those who have a lot of responsibilities and who are in constant contact with others.