Low pay, high workloads and labor shortages are all contributing to widespread burnout among U.S. doctors that could spell disaster for health care, a new survey shows.
Doximity today released its 2024 Physician Compensation Report, in which approximately 81% of physicians say they are overworked, the report is shared exclusively by Doximity, an online networking platform for medical professionals wealth. Researchers surveyed 33,000 full-time U.S. doctors in 2023 and drew on data from thousands of other recent surveys. Another 88% said existing physician shortages have impacted their practices, and 86% said they were concerned about the U.S. health care system’s ability to care for its aging population.
Morale is low and about 30% of doctors are considering early retirement, a potential disaster in a country where 70% of people already feel the health care system has failed them.
“We often find ourselves stretched thin,” said Dr. Amit Phull, Doximity’s chief physician experience officer and emergency medicine physician. wealth. “I think as [pandemic] Once the dust settles, there’s going to be a lot of reconsideration for those who may have initially thought, “This is where I need to be, this is why I train.” They are now rethinking the medical profession from a cost and balance perspective.
Less work, more salary
Doctors have always had a difficult job, whether that means long, emotional conversations, or A dizzying responsibility.
But today’s patients are sicker than they were a few decades ago and often suffer from multiple comorbidities such as arthritis, diabetes and asthma. “The fear of caring for this aging, sicker population is even more daunting,” Fehr said.
Physicians continue to experience a heavy administrative burden, which is one of the most significant drains on their time and energy, the report said. For every hour of direct patient care, doctors spend about two hours on paperwork during the day and another one to two hours at night. About 75% of the doctors surveyed said that reducing administrative burdens can effectively improve feelings of overwork and burnout.
“Is there an imbalance between what we go to school for, what we train for, and what we actually, really do? I think the improvement there could be pretty substantial,” Phil said.
While physician salaries are actually increasing overall, earnings numbers don’t tell the whole story. The report said that by 2023, the average salary of doctors will increase by 6%, with doctors in major metropolitan areas such as San Jose, California, and St. Louis, Missouri making approximately $450,000 per year. But the report said that since 2001, Medicare physician salaries have fallen sharply by 26%, and many areas have not adequately adjusted physician pay after several years of high inflation. Many doctors also carry the burden of medical school debt, with the average loan for a physician being about $200,000, according to the Education Data Initiative.
That means that while some doctors are being paid well, many have actually seen their adjusted pay drop — a bitter pill to swallow, especially considering that many Americans still believe all doctors are wealthy.
To be sure, doctors are still well compensated relative to the median income of the U.S. workforce. According to the latest earnings report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average salary for a full-time worker in the United States is just over $59,000, while the average salary for physicians in metropolitan areas is about $400,000. But Phil said the gap between people’s perceptions of doctors’ salaries and how demanding and precarious the job actually has become is one of the factors contributing to burnout and disillusionment.
“As a physician in today’s health care system, there is a dissonance between reality and what other people think,” he said.
The gender pay gap that plagues the entire U.S. workforce is particularly pronounced among this group of professionals, too. This number will drop slightly from 26% in 2022 to 23% in 2023, but is still significant, the report said. Female doctors earn, on average, nearly $102,000 less than their male counterparts. Doximity further estimates that over the course of a career, male physicians in the same field earn more than $2 million more than female physicians.
“I can’t believe it’s so high,” Dr. Tinaju told wealth. As a pediatrician in San Diego, Zhu works in one of the lowest-paid fields of medicine and is one of the most underpaid in the country.
“It’s definitely a bit depressing to read this report,” she added. “But it also brings awareness and transparency, because without it, I wouldn’t know my potential value and be able to advocate for myself in the future.”
The future of medicine
As the U.S. population ages, so do doctors.
Even before issues arose about burnout leading to early retirement, the geriatric physician community posed a threat to the existing health care system. Doximity’s report supports previously released findings from the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) that 20% of today’s physicians are 65 years or older and 22% are between 55 and 64 years old. The United States will face a shortage of up to 86,000 doctors by 2036.
Phil said the issue of finding a replacement was complex. First, new doctors are not entering the workforce quickly enough. The creation of new positions that would help alleviate the physician shortage, including nurse practitioners and physician assistants, has also failed to keep pace with the labor shortage.
So are we all doomed? Not necessarily, said Phil, who remains optimistic about the future of U.S. health care despite all these challenges. For example, many doctors hope that the Federal Trade Commission’s recent ban on non-compete clauses may ultimately be beneficial.
“This could bring about a huge change in the field, where doctors like me will have more mobility [who] Licensed in some states,” he said. “My ability to practice in many other areas could expand exponentially, which would ideally alleviate the physician workforce shortage.”
Survey respondents had other ideas on how to help reduce the burden: increasing education funding to train more doctors, implementing loan forgiveness programs to incentivize work in underserved areas, expanding virtual visit options to increase patient access to care, and using Artificial intelligence tools assist administrative tasks.
“Doctors interviewed said that if they had sophisticated artificial intelligence tools, they could save 12 to 13 hours per week. [for] Documentation, helping them take notes, helping write appeal letters,” Phil said. “So I think this could be a huge improvement.”
