Assessment of Employee Burnout in Rural Family Physicians in the City of Mashhad in 2014

Employee burnout results in decreased human power and efficiency. In caring professions such as medical profession, constant stress causes employee burnout. We aimed to assess employee burnout in rural family physicians in the city of Mashhad in 2014. In a cross sectional study, 120 rural family physicians were studied. All participants completed a questionnaire using the Maslach Burnout Inventory, to determine the prevalence and severity of employee burnout. In regard to frequency, rural family physicians showed low emotional exhaustion (56.2%), high personal accomplishment (39.3%) and depersonalization (74.2%). Furthermore severity of medium emotional exhaustion, high personal accomplishment and medium depersonalization were 67.4, 50.6 and 47.2%, respectively. Emotional exhaustion was the independent variable most strongly associated with marital and employment status. Official rural family physicians showed more emotional exhaustion. As work environment affects family physician`s mental health, preventive procedures must be taken in order to prevent from employee burnout. These may include developing strategies for decreasing stressful factors such as spiritual management support, physician’s involvement in decision making, reduce working hours, increase salaries and implement a uniform policymaking among various family physician staff.