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Most Doctors Work While Sick, Despite Knowing It's Bad For Patients
An anonymous reader writes: A new survey published in JAMA Pediatrics found that 95% of doctors believe patients are put at risk when doctors work while sick. Despite that, 83% of respondents said they had "come to work with symptoms like diarrhea, fever and respiratory complaints during the previous year." The researchers doing the survey dug into the reasons for this: first of all, given the heavy workload of most doctors, it's very difficult to find others who can take up the slack when one is recovering from an illness. Beyond that, the profession is pervaded by a culture of working through the discomfort and pain of minor maladies. According to a commentary on the research, hospital policies don't help matters — they often incentivize long hours and don't encourage ill workers to leave the premises.
While it is true that there are doctors working while they themselves are not feeling well, you guys gotta understand that doctors have to face sick people ALL THE TIME, which means they have higher chance of getting infected with diseases, which means they have to spend more times feeling unwell
It is always so easy to criticize someone of doing something but why is it there is no mention of what makes that someone do that something in the first place?
I would rather work harder and longer hours today than have to take off a day myself (and possibly come in a day or two when I am recovering myself).
I know of NO ONE in my office that doesn't think people should stay home when we are sick.
Of course, it helps that I work for a law firm that is more concerned with obeying the law than most work places.
I think this is one aspect of poor management., Management sets the tone - do they complain etc. when you call in sick? If they don't, then people take off when they are sick.
It is truly a shame that hospital management is so penny-wise/pound foolish as not to insist on generous sick time.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
There's your problem right there. If you're sick, you're sick. You already feel bad, so beating yourself up for staying home is just giving in to this ridiculous work ethic. And that work ethic? It's nothing but crude mind control. We're told that we're supposed to have a special "ethic" that means if you're not suffering, you're not earning your pay. And if your job requires you to get a doctor's excuse to take a day off work, you need to give notice tomorrow and find another job.
The corporatists have done a number on your head. Resist it.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Medical school hours and conditions looks like a giant hazing ritual. Plenty of science shows it is dumb and make all mortal humans more error prone. Somehow the medical profession thinks they are super-human (or must act as if they are) and put their patients in increased danger from fatigue and apparently illness as well.
Listening to an NPR piece on residency some months back sounded really pathetic. The pervasive attitude was that it made you a better doc, and since everyone else went through it then I have to too. Someone needs to get through that the emperor has no clothes and this is just stupid.
In the end my experience with docs is they are all pretty darn human, and all this hazing and stupid over-work ethic does nothing more than give them a false sense that they are not.