Academic burnout - what have I not tried to do?
I am a junior faculty member in a peds non-surgical subspecialty (outpatient) at a large pediatric academic hospital w/ SOM affiliation. Feeling very burned out about my current position and like I have tried making changes that would make me more satisfied. Wanted to share my story and get some advice/perspective. 3 main concerns:
- Clinic logistics - I am starting to feel really burned out by the large number of patients that are referred to me who really have absolutely no reason to be seeing me - chronic abdominal pain, headaches, lactose intolerance, rashes that need to go to Derm and not me. Feels like lack of PCP education + no referral screening/triage system at all. Most referrals are faxed with 0 clinical information for me to review. I have tried advocating for processes to triage referrals or at least do SOMETHING besides scheduling anything that comes in to us, but nobody is willing to significantly put effort into this. I can no longer stand spending a large part of every day disappointing people who don’t need to see me. I also asked to spearhead expanding clinical offerings (injections, procedures) at the satellite clinic I practice at and repeatedly get told ‘no’ because we are just focusing on expanding/maintaining things at the main location. I am missing out on conditions & procedures I trained for because of this.
- MyChart/portal - Lots of long messages from parents asking for advice, random questions or thoughts, even right after I spend a lot of time in person with them. In our current clinical setup, the nurse receives the message and 90% of the time immediately forwards to me without any help. If I asked all of these parents to schedule follow ups with me instead of MyCharting, they’d have to wait 4-6 weeks at least to get any answers though. Was also sent inappropriate messages by a parent (accused of being racist, demanding re-testing, sharing their own life story about their chronic illness). When I told clinic leadership, they sent me a list of 5 things I could try to make the patient feel better.
- Compensation/benefits: Pay is $180k/yr for my 3rd year out of fellowship. Discretionary funds (CME, conference travel, board and licensing fees) were cut by 60% to $1200/yr with no notice halfway through this academic year. They are pulling some nursing staff from our clinic to cover extra “make up clinics” at other locations for docs who used too much time away (not me).
Should I consider PP or is there more I could do to advocate for the changes I feel like I need? Feeling like it’s an uphill battle given how large the institution is and how many layers of people involve themselves when someone tries to make a change.
Update: Thank you all, lots of great ideas and perspectives here.