Well-Being in Academic Medicine

Well-being in academic medicine has emerged as a critical issue facing faculty, researchers, residents, and students. The AAMC has issued a statement on clinician well-being (PDF), and participates in the National Academy of Medicine’s Action Collaborative on Clinician Well-Being and Resilience, a network of 150 (and growing) organizations dedicated to promoting clinician well-being across all career stages and specialties. The following resources help explain and address the challenges.

Please let us know if you have any suggested books, articles, or other resources to share with your colleagues and we will consider including on these pages.

The Latest in Well-Being

• Colleges and Universities Need Campuswide Culture Change to Better Support Students’ Well-Being and Address Mental Health Problems - National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM)

• Well-being during the coronavirus outbreak:

  • Nearly 60% of Physicians Report Burnout Since COVID-19 - Modern Healthcare

  • COVID-19 Well-Being Response Toolkit - Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai's Office of Well-Being and Resilience

  • 5-minute Guided Meditation Led by CFAS Chair-elect Adi Haramati, PhD

  • Tell Me More^® kit for COVID-19 care - The Arnold P. Gold Foundation

  • Coronavirus Sanity Guide - Ten Percent Happier

  • You Can't Pour From an Empty Cup: Why Clinicians'​ Spiritual Health Matters in the Time of COVID-19 - LinkedIn

  • Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) News and Resources - National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine

  • Positive Psychology in Times of Crisis - American College of Physicians (ACP)

  • COVID-19: Practical Advice and Support from Internists on the Front Lines - American College of Physicians (ACP)

  • Care For Your Coronavirus Anxiety - Shine

  • Maintaining Mental Health During the Coronavirus Pandemic - The Steve Fund

  • I’m a nun and I’ve been social distancing for 29 years. Here are tips for staying home amid coronavirus fears. - New Jersey.com

  • Resources to Stay Physically and Mentally Healthy During the Coronavirus Pandemic - Google Doc

  • Emergency Responders: Tips for taking care of yourself - CDC

  • Stress and Coping - CDC

  • Taking Care of Your Emotional Health - CDC

  • Helping Children Cope - CDC

  • Coronavirus and Mental Health:  Taking Care of Ourselves During Infectious Disease Outbreaks - American Psychiatric Association

  • Taking Care of Your Family During Coronavirus and Other Emerging Infectious Disease Outbreaks - Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress

• Wellbeing Resource Library - Intensive Care Society

• Improving the System to Support Clinician Well-being and Provide Better Patient Care - JAMA

• ACGME Launches AWARE Well-Being Resources

• Data Points: Physician burnout rates vary by specialty - Modern Healthcare

• Moral injury and burnout in medicine: a year of lessons learned - STAT

• Physician burnout: Why legal and regulatory systems may need to step in - The Conversation

• What's Doctor Burnout Costing America? - NPR

• Well-Being Playbook: A Guide for Hospital and Health System Leaders - AHA

• Suicide Prevention in University Settings - Edge for Scholars

• Experts share facts about physician suicide - Reuters

Getting Help

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Institutions can implement the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention's Interactive Screening Program (ISP), an online program utilized by mental health services.
• Preventing Physician Distress and Suicide - an online module from the AMA's Steps Forward initiative (0.5 CME credits)
• Validated Instruments to Assess Work-Related Dimensions of Well-Being from the National Academy of Medicine's Action Collaborative on Clinician Well-Being and Resilience.

Featured

• AAMC Analysis in Brief: Burnout Among U.S. Medical School Faculty - AAMC

• It's Not Burnout, It's Moral Injury - YouTube

• Medical Student Well-Being - AAMC

• To Care Is Human — Collectively Confronting the Clinician-Burnout Crisis - The New England Journal of Medicine

• A Doctor's Dozen: Twelve Strategies for Personal Health and a Culture of Wellness - Catherine Florio Pipas

• Association Between Physician Burnout and Patient Safety, Professionalism, and Patient Satisfaction - A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis - JAMA Internal Medicine

• Charter on Physician Well-being - JAMA (April 17, 2018)

• Clinician Well-Being Knowledge Hub - National Academy of Medicine (2018)

• Physician Burnout in the Electronic Health Record Era: Are We Ignoring the Real Cause? - Annals of Internal Medicine (May 8, 2018)

• Addressing Clinician Well-Being - AAMC President and CEO Darrell G. Kirch, MD, NAM President Victor J. Dzau, MD, and ACGME CEO Thomas J. Nasca, MD (2018)

• Combating Clinician Burnout with Community-Building - NEJM Catalyst (July 31, 2018)

• Physician Burnout, Well-being, and Work Unit Safety Grades in Relationship to Reported Medical Errors - Mayo Clinic Proceedings (July 9, 2018)

• Learning Environment and Its Effect on Learner Wellness and Resilience - Academic Medicine (July 11, 2018)

• Back to Bedside Projects Energize Residents, Improving Care - AAMCNews (May 8, 2018)

• Why medicine leads the professions in suicide, and what we can do about it - The Conversation (May 24, 2018)

• Finding the Why, Changing the How: Improving Mental Health of Medical Students, Residents, and Physicians - Academic Medicine (September 2016)

• "Make the Difference: Preventing Medical Trainee Suicide" (video)
  Mayo Clinic and the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention explain how health care professionals can recognize signs of depression in their colleagues and take action to prevent suicide.

• 10 Facts About Physician Suicide and Mental Health 

  
  The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention presents 10 important facts concerning physician suicide and mental health.

• Steps Forward
  A collection of modules from the AMA on well-being.

• Getting to Inbox Zero (video)
  Petra Lewis, MD, Professor of Radiology and OBGYN at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, presents a video on how to avoid being overwhelmed by email by effectively managing your inbox.

• Task Managers (video)
  Petra Lewis, MD, also describes how to manage numerous tasks effectively by using task managers.

Conferences, Programs, and Courses

Learning Resources for Leading: Top Skills, Attributes, and Behaviors Critical for Success

This collection of resources is intended to help department chairs develop skills in setting expectations, working effectively with colleagues, developing leadership skills, and dealing with challenging responsibilities.

Stanford House Staff Wellness Survey, Courtesy of Stanford Medicine and WellMD

This evaluation was designed by Stanford School of Medicine to "understand the state of the medical staff and their most pressing concerns, as well as to provide a vehicle for assessing pilot studies and creating evidence-based interventions."
Take the survey

Being a Resilient Leader

Being a Resilient Leader is a two-day, interactive and unique workshop that will cover what it means to be a resilient leader and how to exercise leadership to achieve desired results, sustained impact, and long-term professional engagement and personal satisfaction. You will walk away with a new framework and practical tools for navigating your most difficult leadership challenges, along with increased self-awareness, emotional intelligence, and commitment.

Faculty Training in Mind-Body Medicine

Faculty Training in Mind-Body Medicine is an experiential program provides faculty at health professional schools with the training, tools, and strategic thinking necessary to implement mind-body medicine skills groups in their institutions.