Study On Job Burnout Of Medical Professionals From The Perspective Of Social Support Theory

Job burnout has been a common problem in modern society that was defined as a syndrome of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization of others, and a feeling of reduced personal accomplishment by Maslach. Job burnout could have a negative influence on the individual, family, organization, even the whole society. Medical professionals were vulnerable to job burnout, which should be paid more attention.ObjectivesTo investigate the job burnout of medical professionals in different medical institutions, and analyze its demographic characteristics; to explore the effects of social support (perceived or work-related social support) and personality (such as Extraversion, Neuroticism, Psychoticism, and Perfectionism) on job burnout; to examine the correlation between the macro (institutional), organizational, job stress and burnout; to put forward the preventions and interventions to reduce job burnout based on the findings.MethodsData resources: Data were collected through questionnaire survey. The empirical study consisted of three sections. As for Section One, 252 medical professionals working in three hospitals completed a questionnaire that included MBI-HSS (Maslach Burnout Inventory-Human Services Survey), EPQ (Eysenck Personality Questionnaire), PSSS (perceived social support scale), and organizational commitment. As for Section Two, 329 medical professionals from four kinds of medical institutions participated the investigation, and the questionnaire included MBI-HSS, perfectionism scale, work-related social support scale (four subscales: superior, colleague, patient and family support), and perceived sources of stress survey. Section Three investigated 91 nurse managers, and the questionnaire was the same as that used in Study Two except that the patient support scale was replaced by the subordinate one, and the depersonalization dimension of job burnout was modified to orient to the subordinate.Using SPSS, the data were analyzed by descriptive analysis, t test, ANOVA, correlation, multiple regression, Logistic regression, and path analysis.ResultsThe paper presumed that social support should be seen as a network which included institutional, organizational and workplace support systems. An institution-organization- individual mechanism model was put up to explain job burnout. Stress caused by lacking institutional support would affect the individual directly and indirectly through the organizational and personal characteristics. Stress caused by lacking organizational support would impact the individual directly and indirectly through the personal characteristics. Work related support and personal characteristics would influence the individual. And the burnout would have negative effects on the individual, family, organization, and society.The risk factors at macro level to medical professionals'burnout included the cultural values, health system, laws and regulations, tense relationship between medical staffs and patients, mass media, over-high expectation of people, and so on.The results of the study which examined the relationship between perceived social support, personality, and burnout showed that 72.4% medical professionals got moderate and high scores on EE (Emotional Exhaustion) and as for DP (Depersonalization) and PA (Personal Accomplishment), the respective proportions were 49.8% and 54.6%. Ordinal Logistic regression analyses indicated that among marital status, educational background, age, on duty at night, personality (Extraversion, Neuroticism, and Psychoticism), perceived social support, and the hospital type, the predictors for EE were hospital type(OR=0.175), Neuroticism (OR=1.147), Extraversion (OR=0.911), and educational background (OR=2.794); those for DP were Psychoticism (OR=1.418) and Neuroticism (OR=1.081); those for PA were Psychoticism (OR=0.855), Extraversion (OR=1.129) and age(OR=1.004); perceived social support did not enter any of the three Logistic regression equations. From the path analysis, PA and Psychoticism had a relationship with affective and normative commitment; three dimensions of burnout and Extraversion affected economic and opportunity commitment; and DP and PA predicted ideal commitment.When exploring the influence of the work-related social support, perceived sources of stress and perfectionism on the burnout, it was found that 73.2%, 47.4%, and 41.1% respectively medical professionals were experiencing moderate and high levels of EE, DP, and PA. Three separate hierarchical multiple regression analyses (the variables at the first block were gender, marital status, career, educational background, title, on duty at night, sleep quality, satisfaction with income, and hospital type; the variables at the second block included perfectionism (four dimension: Doubts about Actions, Concern over Mistakes, Personal Standards, and Plan and Control), work-related social support (superior, colleague, patient and family support), and perceived sources of stress (at macro, organizational, professional and job level)) revealed that: (a) EE was predicted by hospital type, macro stress, two dimension of perfectionism (Doubts about Actions and Personal Standards); (b) DP was predicted by hospital type, gender, satisfaction with income, job stress, patient support, Doubts about Actions, and Personal Standards; and (c) PA was predicted by title, superior support, family support, Concern over Mistakes, and Personal Standards.As far as nurse managers were concerned, the empirical investigation indicated that compared with medical professionals, the nurse managers had lower EE and higher PA. The demographic variables such as age, educational background, title, and position had no significant effects on any dimension of job burnout. There were significantly differences among different amount of work, work hour, sleep quality, overtime, and hospital type. Among the 22 perceived sources of stress, eight ones were related significantly to EE, and three ones for DP, and none for PA. There were significantly relationship between Doubts about Actions and EE, Personal Standards and PA, superior support and PA, colleague support and DP and PA.In conclusion, macro stress caused by lacking institution and environmental support had a significant effect on job burnout. Medical institution type was an important predictor to burnout. The general social support had a limit influence on reducing job burnout, and the work-related social support was closely associated with burnout. At the individual level, Extraversion, Neuroticism, and Psychoticism and some dimension of Perfectionism were the risk factors to burnout. There were some demographic differences on job burnout.SuggestionsThe interventions at macro level were to advocate cultural value of qualitative life, to develop harmonious relationship between medical professionals and patients, to establish good medical environment, to promote the health education, to improve the social public relations, and so on.The interventions at organizational level were to pay more attention to the mental health of staffs and improve management such as reducing the role ambiguity and role conflict, giving more autonomy to staffs, reducing the work overload, improving the sleep quality, promoting fair motivation, implementing career life plan, eliminating the stressor, enhancing the superior, colleague, patient and family support, carrying out the training, and so on.As for the interventions at personal level, some programs such as realistic job preview and expectation lowering procedure could be applied for the newcomer. And employee assistance program could be applied for the staffs.InnovationsThe paper constructed an institution-organization-personality mechanism model, and confirmed the effect of macro stress (institutional and environmental) on job burnout. The paper called on paying more attention to the macro institutional and environmental factors besides the organizational, job and role, and personal characteristics;The paper examined the general social support and work-related social support respectively, and the investigation found the latter was the more important predictor to burnout;Since few empirical studies at domestic were carried out to explore the relationship between Perfectionism and burnout, the current study would be a domestic-leading one in this field. And the study showed job burnout was attributed to some dimensions of Perfectionism.