The Dark Side of Doctoring
My wife is a medical resident and the issues described by this doctor are absolutely pervasive in residency.<p>The strange part is, the overwork also seems to be pervasive among the attending physicians who have been out of residency for decades. Not just the residents.<p>As a tech founder analyzing the system from the outside, I think this writer has nailed the core issue: "... a doctor is just one of the many commodities in this complex industry. It’s no longer about the patient. It’s about the business of hospitals."<p>If doctors were viewed in their industry the way software engineers are viewed in ours -- as specialized skilled labor with <i>extreme</i> leverage and limited time -- then we would have well-supported, well-rested, and well-compensated doctors.<p>But as it stands, we have overworked and overtired doctors buried under a mountain of clerical work, who need to slot their patient in to 15-minute "encounters" in clinic to keep the profit machine running. Meanwhile, administrators, health insurance executives, and medical equipment CEOs work 9-to-5 and earn millions. It really boggles the mind and infuriates me, as a technologist.<p>p.s. Don't listen to any of the comment threads here that say long hours are required to reduce patient handoffs. Yes, it's true, patient handoffs cause some danger. But tired doctors make mistakes. Period. And, as this post indicates, a perpetually tired doctor burns out and either quits the profession or (worse) commits suicide, which is the <i>worst</i> possible outcome for the system.