Stress management in a medical career

Abstract

Stress is both the psychological and physical experienced when an individual perceives their resources as insufficient to cope with the demands of a situation. A medical career can be stressful. The work of health-care professionals involves taking responsibility for other individuals' lives and mistakes can have detrimental consequences. Work can involve long hours, night shifts, and high-risk situations. High levels of stress among doctors contribute to job dissatisfaction, emotional burnout, and clinical depression, and can undermine the achievement of goals, both for individuals and for organizations. Stress management is therefore a fundamental skill for all medical professionals. This article discusses strategies for managing stress, starting with self-analysis and outlining two main stress management techniques that can be taken at an individual level.