Occupational stress and professional burnout of doctors in a specialized medical organization

The purpose of the work is to study the characteristics of professional burnout among GPs and surgical physicians in a specialized hospital. Material and methods. The study was performed at the Department of Occupational Diseases and Clinical Pharma cology named after honored scientist of the Russian Federation professor V.V. Kosarev, FSBEI HE Samara State Medical University of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Fed eration, and the Department of Occupational Pathology, Regional Center for Occupational Pathology SBHI SR Samara City Hospital No. 5. The study was carried out within the framework of the complex topic of the Department of Occupational Diseases and Clinical Pharmacology named after honored scientist of the Russian Federation professor V.V. Kosarev, FSBEI HE Samara State Medical University, "Problems of polymorbidity, diag nostics, prognosis, and prevention of occupational and work-related diseases in work ers with isolated combined exposure to factors of the production environment and the work process" (registration number 124053000016-4, date of registration 05/30/2024). Patient consent. Each participant in the study provided informed voluntary written con sent to take part in the study and to the publication of personal medical information in an anonymized form. The study included: group 1 – general surgeons (n=52 participants); group 2 – gastroenterologists (n=48 participants); group 3 – cardiovascular surgeons (n=31 participants); group 4 – cardiologists (n=36 participants); group 5 – surgical oncol ogists (n=48 participants); group 6 – therapeutic oncologists (n=46 participants); group 7 – control: workers in engineering, technical, and economic specialties whose activity is not related to medical organizations (healthy) (n=65 participants). The assessment of professional burnout in medical workers was carried out using the Maslach Burnout Inventory developed by C. Maslach and S.E. Jackson and adapted by N.E. Vodopyanova. The level of depression was assessed using the Beck Depression Inventory, developed based on the authors' clinical observations, which allowed them to identify a limited set of the most relevant and significant symptoms of depression and the most frequently reported patient complaints. The scale allows suspecting a diagnosis of depression and refer a patient to a specialist. Statistical analysis was performed using the RStudio programming language and environment (R v.4.4.1, RStudio 2024.09.1+394). Descriptive statistics for continuous data were calculated as the mean, with 95% confidence intervals; the median, 25% and 75% quartiles, and interquartile range were used for nonparametric data. Although the data did not follow a normal distribution, the groups were larger than 30 observations, which, according to the central limit theorem, allows us to use the mean and 95% confidence intervals to describe the variables. The X2 criterion was used to compare percentages. When assessing differences in nonparametric data groups, the Mann-Whitney U test was applied for two comparison groups, and the Kruskal–Wallis test – for more than 2 groups. Results. The professional activity of GPs and surgical physicians is associated with the impact of chronic occupational stress, leading to the development of professional burnout. Limitations of the study. The study has regional (Samara Region) and professional (in terms of detailing working conditions in the studied comparison groups) limitations. Conclusion. Thus, the obtained data indicate that when identifying risk factors for an increase in the level of professional burnout among healthcare workers providing medical care in general therapeutic, general surgical, and specialized hospitals, there is the need to use specialized rehabilitation measures for medical workers with relaxation techniques, art therapy, as well as professional adaptation programs, physiotherapeutic techniques, such as electrosleep and reflexology, and, if possible, resort treatment in health care centers, local sanatoriums, etc. with visits to psychotherapy offices, as well as psychopharmacological medications.