These Six Specialties Have the Highest Rates of Burnout

Although physician burnout rates fell in 2023, the American Medical Association highlighted six specialties with the highest rates of burnout in its latest survey.

Those specialties are (compared with their 2022 data):

• Emergency medicine: 56.5% — down from 62%
• Internal medicine: 51.4% — down from 52%
• Ob/gyn: 51.2% — down from 54%
• Family medicine: 51% — down from 58%
• Pediatrics: 46.9% — down from 55%
• Hospital medicine: 44% — down from 59%

Last week, results from the 2023 AMA Organizational Biopsy showed that physician burnout overall fell below 50% for the first time since 2020. In 2023, 48.2% of physicians reported experiencing at least one symptom of burnout, down from 53% in 2022. Record-high burnout occurred in 2021, at 62.8%.

The results are based on responses from more than 12,400 physicians in 31 states and 81 health systems and organizations who filled out the survey during the course of the year. Physicians were surveyed on six key indicators: job satisfaction, job stress, burnout, intent to leave an organization, feeling valued by an organization, and total hours spent per week on work-related activities.

AMA noted that just 48.7% of pediatricians reported feeling valued by their organization, down from 52% in 2022. Both family medicine physicians and internists fell below 50% on this indicator, AMA reported.

On the other hand, 51.6% of ob/gyns reported feeling valued by their organization, up from 40% the year prior.

Indeed, more physicians overall felt valued by their organization, at 50.4%, up from 46.3% in 2022, AMA said, calling this indicator a “striking mitigator of burnout.” Still, 16% did not feel valued at all by their organization, though that was less than the 18% from the previous year.

Other key findings in the latest survey included an increase in job satisfaction, at 72.1%, up from 68% in 2022, and a decrease in job-related stress, down to 50.7% from 55.6% the year prior. Notably, the report showed that more than a quarter of physicians said their stress was due to a shortage of physicians and support staff, and 12.7% said their stress was due to the volume of administrative tasks.

While declining rates of burnout are a milestone in efforts to address physician burnout, more work must be done to address the root causes of burnout and provide support to physicians in all specialties, AMA said.

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