Why Doctors are Quitting Medicine

Since I've been doing so many videos discussing doctors quitting medicine and reacting to them, I thought it was time to do a deep dive to try and figure out exactly why so many doctors and other healthcare workers are leaving medicine all together. I found a few recent articles published in the last few months discussing the attrition rate in medicine, so I wanted to go through them and try to figure out what is going on! I definitely have my own ideas, and I will talk about them as well!

2:15 - Why Doctors are Leaving Medicine
10:00 - How to Fix the Problem

Join this channel to get access to perks:

______
CONTACT ME:

📹 TikTok - @DrCellini
-----------
-----------
MY TOOLS & GEAR:

**As an Amazon Associate I earn commission with use of the above links on qualifying purchases**
-----------

OTHER STUFF:


#doctor #doctorsquit #quitmyjob

[tozmom]

I’m a senior psychiatrist. I have another 20 or so years of working life in me, but am leaving in three years when my relatively modest mortgage is paid off. For me it is the massive increase in workload caused by society shifting more and more things into “pathology”. The hardest diagnosis I make in my field is “Your emotional responses to what is going on in your life are normal.” For some reasons patients hate hearing this as they have come to believe they have “bipolar” or “adhd” or some other “disease entity” that shifts personal responsibility from themselves and on to me and my medications. I used to actually care and would patiently at length explain why the patients emotional issues did not need a psychiatric diagnostic label, but I just got complaint after complaint with management always coming down on the side of the person making the complaint. I am not allowed to be my true self and act in good faith- so I’ve given up and now don’t actually care. Related, but different, is the notion adopted by society at large and management is that whenever a patient ends their life it must be because someone in mental health services made a mistake or didn’t do their job. I have literally had the father of a patient with borderline personality disorder scream and shout at me threatening to sue me for all I am worth, because I could not stop his daughter that he ostensibly loved so much from hurting herself. I could not point out to him (because he’d have attacked me and/or management would discipline me for being unprofessional) that his daughter was the way she was because he “loved” her, sometimes twice in the same evening from the age of 3 onwards, in the way no adult should “love” their child. I actively dissuade young enthusiastic intelligent folks from entering medicine generally and psychiatry specifically. It is a disaster.

[leahrowe]

As a healthcare worker seeing how the hospitals actually feel about the employees during the pandemic was eye opening. It’s all about money and what the pharmacy/insurance companies want it’s more a factory line than a treatment center at this point

[IvanValdez]

12 years ago, these statistics discouraged me from going to med school. After a PhD in biomedical science and working in healthcare consulting, I finally had the courage to give medicine a shot. I will be attending med school this Fall of 2022, and I am super excited 💯 Thanks, Dr. Cellini, for putting out content showing that a career in medicine can be challenging at times but also fun and rewarding.

[BrateTebra]

I feel you bro, I left medicine 2 years ago because of burnout, workload, attack from patients, threats from patients and colleagues resulted in anxiety and depression. I left medicine because I had a plan B and started working as designer. A total revelation for me!! I never knew life could be so stress free and rewarding. In addition to me being without anxiety for a while, always well rested, ready to hang-around with people and enjoy life. I also earn much more while having time to enjoy with my close ones and actually using my medical skill s for the people I are most (my family and close ones)

[nostrilnick]

I feel for the doctors, nurses, and other front line medical workers. My mother was an RN at a large hospital for 35 years and finally couldn't take the stress any longer (thankfully, she retired over 10 years ago). Hospitals being run like for-profit businesses needs to stop and the money redistributed down to the working level employees. With an ever aging population, we desperately need to invest more in our doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals now more than ever.

[dalin]

I am a family doc. I have heard the term burnout thrown around a lot, but I don't think this is the appropriate term to use. "Burnout" implies that there is something wrong with the person...not resilient enough somehow...if only we could have one more lesson on meditation and stress management! We work in a broken healthcare system while trying to do everything we can for our patients. Its not burnout...we are being injured in our most basic morality and being blamed for not being more resilient. This is victim blaming! until the system is fixed the problem of health care providers becoming dissatisfied, depressed and leaving the medical field with continue.

[thirdoctoberchild]

I’m not sure about America but here in Sweden, another major contributor is lack of support/supervision. Younger doctors having to take too much responsibility with no or minimal supervision, and older doctors being moved around or even if they’re in their own field not having enough time and resources for peer discussions and professional development. This also ties in to not being able to do your job. The moral stress of not being able to provide adequate care, whether it’s due to lack of physical or personal resources, lack of supervision, lack of time etc. Junior doctors going into some work places, especially in emergency medicine, are actively rewarded for being quick and asking less questions which is both a risk for burnout and potentially very dangerous.

[mothudimothudi]

Burnouts, pressure, expectations, workload, ... As a medical I know the urge to quit everyday, it is not an easy journey at all...

[gabriellegrell]

As a pharmacy student and someone who has worked in a retail pharmacy for 6 years it is insane how the pharmacists are treated especially during this pandemic. Most of my pharmacist havent seen a raise in YEARS. we are now doing covid tests, covid antibody tests, covid vaccinations, etc with no extra time, pay, or staff. Not to mention patients are becoming less patient and more entitled.

[pinkcardigan]

When a private practice only wants to pay medical assistants $11-$13 don’t be surprised there are so many openings.

[PKzenn]

Interesting story for me, Im 31 and have been out of medicine for over a year. I made it all the way to the end of my family medicine residency with a contract signed for 200K at a clinic. A couple years prior i had tested postive for mary jane on a hair follicle test. I had some burnout and depression beforehand which i had been addressing. After entering into the physician monitoring program it made my life a disaster. It was financially demanding and i felt never got to the core of my problems despite my most earnest efforts. Moral of the story I ended up relapsing after passing my FM boards on marajuana two years later. I wasnt consciously unhappy or anything, but i had to throw a wrench into things. Needless to say i was excused from residency with 6 weeks left, and did not get to practice medicine. I am now still trying to figure out my actions a year later. I barely have anything after investing everything into myself. Moreover, I can barely get an interview at places like mcdonalds and best buy despite my qualifications. I had no personal problems at work and was well liked as a physician and person ; I respected everyone around me.

I am still struggling to find my path but what i have learned is this. I will not get into another career that is easy for me to neglect myself for the benefit of others. I am no longer dating because I continue to seek satisfaction from external resources. I never thought I would find myself in this situation but alas here I am.
On retrospect this was quite a scattered comment, but I just needed to get this out somewhere in the open.

[lesliecurtis]

As a phlebotomist in a hospital we have been experiencing EXTREME BURNOUT!!! Yesterday alone we only had 2 of us FOR THE WHOLE HOSPITAL!!! I should preface this by saying " our nurses don't draw the blood, we do! So when there's ONLY 2 of us for a whole hospital TRUST ME ITS CRAZY!!! 😔😔😔

[kikidhen]

Med lab tech here. Leaving my job soon- you hit this one out of the park. I’m burned out. I cry just about everyday. All we get is “more-faster” and “not good enough” as reinforcement. I haven’t taken any day off since 2019- because I “can’t” (we are too short staffed). So I’m done.

[franciscofletes]

I’m a psychiatrist who started my career as an Active Duty US Army psychiatrist. Did that for 12 years. Left the Army for locums work. Now do telemedicine exclusively from home. Much better work life balance working from home. Better pay, better hours, more family time… still taking care of patients but now taking care of myself and my family as well. I loved my time on active duty but after 12 years I did have burnout… going to the private sector and working from home made a huge difference

[bashirauwal]

Since I have learned how to save, invest, and put my money to work to increase my income, I am not worried of losing my job as an RN (registered nurse) or leaving my employment. I want freedom to live my life as I see fit, not just financial gain.

[trisia]

This is heartbreaking to me. I absolutely adore my primary care provider and each of my specialists and couldn't imagine being anything but respectful and understanding of how busy they are. I've always been that respectful with my providers.

[ammj]

Two months after I left healthcare I was informed one of my colleagues committed suicide. He had been struggling with the job. I've talked to other healthcare workers who know someone within their line of work who has done the same. This is horrible and I think its not talked about enough. When people say the stress in healthcare is tremendous... its take your own life tremendous. The system is broken and it breaks people in many ways.

[rebecanieves]

You hit the nail on the head! They can also open up more residency jobs since we have way more applicants than positions available. And encourage people to go into nursing, tech jobs, etc via scholarships. We just need more healthcare workers.

[clarissemoraes]

I’m an urgent care receptionist and COVID made me question my medical school interests. Patients are ruthless

[BabyBangdatruth]

As a RT, I experienced all of these factors during the pandemic. Instead of leaving my career, I left the hospital I was working at and picked up travel contracts. I was making 5 to 11K per week most of last year. Now I need is a good CPA.