#1: Clinician Wellbeing & Burnout
How one company is changing the way we think about provider health.
What do people who perform on stage, compete in the Olympics, and serve in the military have in common? They all operate in high-pressure, high-stakes environments.
To cope, the best athletes, musicians, performers, and soldiers in the world use sophisticated wearables to track sleep, nutrition, recovery, and stress. Empowered by biometric health data, users can develop protocols for managing stress and improving well-being in real-time.
Yet, in discussing high-pressure, high-stress occupations, a crucial field, suffering from declining well-being and rapidly increasing churn, has been left out: front-line healthcare workers.
From administrative burden to inadequate decision support tools, clinicians are struggling to meet the broadening demands of a reactive healthcare system. And while there have been pushes for hospital systems to take action in improving provider well-being, current solutions are not comprehensive enough to meet the needs of healthcare workers, costing between $125b and $190b a year in workplace stress-related expenditures.
Already amidst a clinician shortage, a third of RNs would consider leaving nursing due to the pandemic, while a recent Bain & Co. survey revealed that 25% of clinicians are considering switching careers altogether, citing burnout as their primary reason.
Burnout is a psycho-physiological phenomenon referring to complete mental, physical, and emotional exhaustion. The consequences for an athlete suffering burnout may be a series of uncharacteristic losses. The consequences for a clinician are far worse, putting both patient and provider safety at huge risk.
Worst of all, physicians are taking their own lives. Each year, there are 300 to 400 physician suicides in the U.S. Healthcare technicians and support workers are also paying the ultimate price, suffering from a higher risk of suicide compared to non-healthcare professionals.
These statistics are nothing short of alarming, and the current system will only perpetuate ongoing problems. Providers are taught to blunt feelings of anxiety, stress, exhaustion, and even hunger for the sake of patients, and residents consistently log 80+ hours a week of clinical care.
Those dedicating their lives to the service of others should not be disproportionately afflicted by mental and physical illness. While it is important to speak out against the culture of pretending to be okay, there needs to be radical shifts in the way we address healthcare worker well-being.
Enter Arena Labs.
Driven by a human performance approach to clinician well-being, Arena Labs equips providers with the latest in physiological monitoring technology. By connecting health systems with the Arena Strive content platform that supplements insights gained from Oura and Whoop, clinicians gain a greater understanding of their day-to-day physiology and develop protocols for managing stress in real-time.
Treating front-line healthcare workers the same way we treat other high-performing occupations is both intuitive and necessary. While targeting improved clinical workflow, expanding access to mental health support, and dampening administrative burden can reduce burnout, empowering clinicians with their individual health data is an effective enterprise solution that improves patient care by prioritizing provider well-being.
To learn more, listen to this week’s podcast episode with Brian Ferguson, Founder & CEO of Arena Labs.