Emergency medicine physicians are less happy than physicians in general, according to Geneia's Physician Misery Index, a nationwide survey of more than 300 emergency medicine physicians who practice medicine full time.
The survey expands upon Geneia's survey from earlier this year, in which physicians as a whole scored a 3.7 out of 5 on the Physician Misery Index, indicating the scales have tipped from satisfaction to misery. And the newly released results indicate that emergency medicine physicians are even less happy, scoring a 3.9 on the index.
Here are six findings from the survey.
1. Ninety-two percent of emergency medicine physicians believe "business and regulation of healthcare" has negatively changed the practice of medicine.
2. More emergency medicine physicians (67 percent) than their colleagues (51 percent) have considered career options outside of clinical practice as the result of burnout.
As far as restoring the joy of medicine:
3. Most emergency medicine physicians (93 percent) are less frustrated in cases where an advance directive is easily accessible.
4. Eighty-five percent of emergency medicine physicians agree, "When a patient says they have an advance directive, it helps me deliver better quality of patient care."
5. Nearly nine in 10 emergency medicine physicians believe family members are more satisfied with the medical care when patients' wishes are known and communicated in an advance directive.
6. More than half (54 percent) of emergency medicine physicians describe their reaction to learning a patient has an accessible advance directive in place as "relief."