Preferred interventions to improve physician well-being

What interventions hold the most promise for improving physician and nurse well-being and retention?

A recent study published in JAMA Health Forum surveyed 5,312 physicians and 15,738 nurses in hospital-based practice and found that the top interventions were not wellness programs or resilience training. Instead, physicians and nurses wanted "deliberate actions by management"¹ to reduce their workload burdens and increase their control over their time.

Physicians' top-ranked answers

More than 50% of physicians ranked the following actions as "very effective" at improving their well-being:¹

• Reduce clinician time spent on documentation,
• Improve usability of EHR systems,
• Reduce the need to routinely work unscheduled hours,
• Reduce the emphasis on clinician productivity targets,
• Provide support for all clinicians to take breaks without interruption,
• Increase individual control of scheduling.

Nurses' top-ranked answers

More than 50% of nurses ranked the following actions as "very effective" to improving their well-being:¹

• Improve nurse staffing levels, 
• Provide support for all clinicians to take breaks without interruption,
• Improve team communication,
• Enable clinicians to spend more time in direct patient care,
• Increase individual control of scheduling,
• Provide more resources to support new-to-practice clinicians,
• Reduce clinician time spent on documentation,
• Reduce the need to routinely work unscheduled hours,
• Provide greater leadership openness to clinician-led innovations.
  

While management support is key to making these changes in practice, approximately 42% of physicians and 47% of nurses said they lacked confidence that management would resolve identified problems in patient care.

The study found that settings characterized as having too few nurses, unfavorable work environments, and workloads that were beyond the control of clinicians had substantially more physicians and nurses who exhibited high burnout, job dissatisfaction, and intentions to leave their job.

^{1. Aiken LH, Lasater KB, Sloane DM. Physician and nurse well-being and preferred interventions to address burnout in hospital practice. JAMA Health Forum. 2023;4(7):e231809.}

Posted on July 17, 2023, by FPM Editors