Abstract
ABSTRACTPrevious research has shown that residents are at risk for developing burnout. Most burnout measures focus on individual risk factors, although work-organizational-focused measures might be beneficial as well. This study analyzed the relative importance of positive and negative work-organizational stressors, according to residents themselves, with NVivo11. Eleven work-organizational themes were found with deductive reasoning and two themes, recognition and success experiences, were found inductively. Main positive stressors are professional development, receiving feedback, experiencing success, autonomy and social support. Main negative stressors are high workloads, role conflicts/ambiguity, long work hours, and a lack of feedback, a lack of social support, and a lack of professional development. Measures to improve residents’ well-being should not only focus on reducing workload and work hours. Our results suggest to allocate resources to improve supervisors’ skills, such as providing social support, feedback, and recognition. A better match between internship obligations and residents’ studies could also contribute positively to this purpose.
Highlights
Residents are at the highest risk within the medical profession to develop burnout [1]
A high workload, role conflicts and role ambiguity, long work hours, and a lack of feedback, a lack of social support, and a lack of professional development were identified as main negative stressors
Qualitative analysis of a survey on medical residents revealed that professional development, workload, and feedback were identified as the three most often mentioned positive or negative stressors, within a total of 13 different work-organizational-related factors
Summary
Residents are at the highest risk within the medical profession to develop burnout [1]. Depersonalization is a negative, cynical, and disconnected attitude toward work and includes psychological withdrawal from work. It is a selfprotecting mechanism against exhaustion and disappointment. Reduced personal accomplishment is the third dimension of burnout [4], referring to a negative perception of personal competences and job functioning. Burnout may influence the person’s overall physical and psychological well-being [6,7] resulting in health-care organizations facing higher rates of absenteeism [8], job turnover [9], and suboptimal medical care [10,11]
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