Associations of physician burnout with career engagement and quality of patient care: systematic review and meta-analysis (14 September 2022)

Summary

A systematic review and meta-analysis from Hodkinson et al. examines the association of physician burnout with the career engagement and the quality of patient care globally.

A joint team of British and Greek researchers analysed 170 previous observational studies of the links between burnout among doctors, their career engagement and quality of patient care. Those papers were based on the views and experience of 239,246 doctors in countries including the US, UK and others in Africa, Asia and elsewhere globally.

This meta-analysis provides compelling evidence that physician burnout is associated with poor function and sustainability of healthcare organisations primarily by contributing to the career disengagement and turnover of physicians and secondarily by reducing the quality of patient care. Healthcare organisations should invest more time and effort in implementing evidence-based strategies to mitigate physician burnout across specialties, and particularly in emergency medicine and for physicians in training or residency.

Read accompanying BMJ editorial here.