Abstract
[This is an excerpt.] Recently, a British Medical Journal (BMJ) study found that female doctors had a 76 percent higher suicide risk, compared to the general public. The study authors evaluated results from observational studies over a 64-year period across 20 countries. A 2021 study also showed that nurses, particularly female nurses, have a higher rate of suicide than the general population. These results are concerning but not surprising. In April 2020, Lorna Breen, MD, an emergency medicine physician, died by suicide amidst the stressors of the pandemic. Although the pandemic has slowed, providers are still suffering. More recently, William West, MD, an ophthalmology resident in Washington, DC, died by suicide. In one of his final notes, he wrote “Imperfection is not allowed. Weakness is not either. When it’s there, its treated with disdain instead of an opportunity for learning and growth.” In 2022, Congress passed the Dr. Lorna Breen Health Care Provider Protection Act, a first-of-its-kind legislative effort to address burnout and its effects on health workers. While the Dr. Lorna Breen Act has yet to be funded, Congress provided $120 million in the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 to address health and public safety worker mental health and resilience. As a result, the Health Resources and Services Administration awarded 44 grants and one technical assistance center award, the latter of which was named the Workplace Change Collaborative (WCC). The WCC is a partnership of the George Washington University’s Fitzhugh Mullan Institute for Health Workforce Equity, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (a quality improvement think tank and consulting organization), Moral Injury in Healthcare (a nongovernmental advocacy organization), and AFT Healthcare (a labor union). [To read more, click View Resource.]
