Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Physician Burnout: It's Getting Worse
Burnout among U.S. doctors is getting worse, according to a study that shows physicians are worse off today than just three years earlier. Mayo Clinic researchers, working with the American Medical Association, compared data from 2014 to measures they collected in 2011 and found higher measures on the classic signs of professional burnout. More than half of physicians felt emotionally exhausted and ineffective. More than half also said that work was less meaningful. (Sun, 12/8)
The study by researchers from several leading medical schools, including Harvard, Yale, and Cambridge in England, added to a body of work showing that the stress of training can cause depression. And it’s not just the doctors themselves who suffer – patients should worry, too. Depression in residents 'has been linked to poor-quality patient care and increased medical errors,' the researchers note. (Rovner, 12/8)
In other physician news, a group of advocates and doctors is asking the Food and Drug Administration to reconsider a ban on a device the group says would save tens of thousands of women a year from invasive surgery --
A group of physicians and women’s health advocates on Tuesday sent a letter asking the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to rescind or revise its 2014 warning that curtailed the use of a tissue-slicing device in minimally-invasive gynecological surgeries. The device, an electric morcellator, enables uterine tissue to be cut up and removed through tiny abdominal incisions. But the FDA concluded the device could accidentally spread and worsen a hidden uterine cancer called leiomyosarcoma in as many as 1 in 350 women who have a hysterectomy to treat fibroids – common benign growths that can cause abnormal bleeding. The FDA recommended against the use of power morcellation in most women, prompting most hospitals and insurers to restrict or ban it. (McCullough, 12/8)
