Dr K K Aggarwal
President Elect CMAAO
We should all welcome the decision by the World Health Assembly to include work related burnout as a problem that influences health status.
The decision was taken during the World Health Assembly in Geneva.
For long burnout among physicians has been largely ignored by every one.
1. Emotionally exhausted doctors are a danger to patients and a danger to themselves.
2. The number of suicides among doctors resulting from burnout is a significant problem.
3. This World Health Assembly’s decision should lead to a new approach that addresses multiple factors including working conditions for doctors around the world’.
4. The WHO said that “burn-out” remains an “occupational phenomenon” that could lead someone to seek care but it is not considered a medical condition.
5. WHO has now defined burn-out as “a syndrome conceptualised as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed”.
6. The syndrome was characterised by: “1) feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion; 2) increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism related to one’s job; and 3) reduced professional efficacy.”’
