Factors associated with burnout amongst medical students, residents, and attendings in Orthopaedics

BACKGROUND: Burnout is an important and timely topic in medicine as a whole and spine orthopaedics as a specialty. Prior studies analyzing burnout in orthopaedics generally assess for the prevalence of burnout, without using a targeted analysis on possible causes and/or the potential association with work hours. In addition, burnout has not been assessed along the spectrum of the orthopaedist's career. METHODS: An anonymous survey was given to 24 medical students on surgical rotations, 20 orthopaedic residents, and 20 orthopaedic surgeons between June 2019 and August 2019 at a single academic institution. The survey inquired about demographics, general attributes, work hours, and included the aMBI (abbreviated Maslach Burnout Inventory [aMBI]). RESULTS: Residents worked the most hours per week (p <0.0001). Job satisfaction and home support were not significantly different between students, residents, and attendings. Control over life/schedule was greatest for attendings (p=0.0036). In terms of the aMBI scores, depersonalization was highest for residents (p=0.0020), and personal accomplishment was highest for attendings (p=0.0095). Taking all survey participants together, increased work hours correlated with greater depersonalization (p=0.015), greater sense of personal accomplishment (p=0.049), but was not correlated with emotional exhaustion. Higher job satisfaction correlated with lower emotional exhaustion and higher personal accomplishment. CONCLUSION: With work hours correlating with depersonalization and personal accomplishment, continuing to focus on these factors seems important. With higher job satisfaction correlating with lower emotional exhaustion and higher personal accomplishment, burnout is a topic that will need to continue to be addressed for the well-being of our profession.