Physician burnout is undermining patient safety and leading to career dissatisfaction and turnover, according to a new international study that has medical experts calling for urgent action to protect patients, physicians, and health systems.

This report, called “the largest and most comprehensive systematic review and analysis of studies on the subject [of physician burnout] to date” by the BMJ, was conducted by Greek and UK researchers to determine the connections between burnout, physician career engagement, and global patient care quality.

Clinicians suffering burnout are twice as likely to be involved in patient safety incidents. Medical XPress. September 14, 2022.

The researchers analyzed results from 170 observational studies on burnout that involved 239,246 doctors. In addition to its findings about patient safety and career engagement, the study determined that low job satisfaction and burnout were most likely in hospitals among physicians between the ages of 31–50, and those working in intensive care and emergency medicine. The research also found that burnout was least likely among GPs.

Study limitations cited by the authors included a lack of precise definitions of terms including “professionalism,” “job satisfaction,” and “patient safety,” which differed between the 170 studies that were analyzed and could have led to overestimating their connection to physician burnout.

Still, these findings have stirred up concern among doctors worldwide. In a BMJ editorial, Bonn University professor of patient safety Dr. Matthias Weigl called for systemic change to help prevent further burnout-related problems.

Weigl M. Physician burnout undermines safe healthcare. BMJ. 2022;378:o2157.

The mental wellbeing of physicians is vital for safe healthcare systems.

Dr. Weigl also called for “urgent action” such as evidence-based, system-oriented interventions to establish work environments that will prevent burnout and increase staff engagement.