Burnout and Mental Illness related Stigma among Healthcare Professionals in Pakistan

Burnout and Mental illness are both considered the major contributing factors to the global health crisis. The present study aimed to assess burnout and mental illness-related stigma among Pakistani healthcare practitioners. The study design was a descriptive cross-sectional one. Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), a pre-validated tool for measuring burnout, Generalised Anxiety Disorder Scale (GAD-7), a tool for measuring anxiety symptomss, and the Occupational Depression Inventory (ODI) quantified the severity of work-attributed depressive symptoms among 382 healthcare professionals. Data was collected and analyzed using SPSS. Spearman’s correlation determined the relation between burnout dimensions and occupational depression. The results of the current study highlighted overall no significant difference in MBI scores with respect to different demographic characteristics. The results of the present study showed a weak positive correlation between burnout and ODI. However, all the burnout dimensions correlated with each other. The results of the present study concluded that healthcare professionals encounter high levels of burnout along with mild anxiety and a moderate level of occupational depression. Male healthcare professionals had higher symptoms of generalized anxiety disorders as compared to females. Occupational depression was higher among male professionals, those having more than 20 years of experience, and professionals working as nurses and in community pharmacy settings.

1.        Organization WH. The WHO special initiative for mental health (2019-2023): universal health coverage for mental health. JSTOR; 2019.

2.        Heney DB. Solving for stigma in mental health care. J Eval Clin Pract. 2022;28(5):883-9.

3.        Hajebi A, Hashemian SS, Abolhassani M, Hajebi A, Alizadeh K, Rahnejat AM, et al. Assessing the impact of stigma reduction interventions in Iran: A qualitative study from the perspective of mental health stakeholders. Front Public Health. 2022;10:1027002.

4.        Akova İ, Kiliç E, Özdemir ME. Prevalence of burnout, depression, anxiety, stress, and hopelessness among healthcare workers in COVID-19 pandemic in Turkey. INQUIRY. 2022;59:00469580221079684.

5.        Vaičienė V, Blaževičienė A, Macijauskiene J, Sidebotham M. The prevalence of burnout, depression, anxiety and stress in the Lithuanian midwifery workforce and correlation with sociodemographic factors. Nurs Open. 2022;9(4):2209-16.

6.        Fernandes R, Sordi B, Vidigal B, Martins A, Bobbili S, Ventura C. Stigma experienced by people with mental illness in South America: an integrative review. Mendeley Data. 2022.

7.        Fischer IC, Norman SB, Feder A, Feingold JH, Peccoralo L, Ripp J, et al. Downstream consequences of moral distress in COVID-19 frontline healthcare workers: Longitudinal associations with moral injury-related guilt. Gen Hosp Psychiatry. 2022;79:158-61.

8.        Kim B, Jee S, Lee J, An S, Lee SM. Relationships between social support and student burnout: A meta‐analytic approach. Stress Health. 2018;34(1):127-34.

9.        de Mélo Silva Júnior ML, Valença MM, Rocha-Filho PAS. Individual and residency program factors related to depression, anxiety and burnout in physician residents–a Brazilian survey. BMC Psychiatry. 2022;22(1):1-10.

10.      Mitake T, Iwasaki S, Deguchi Y, Nitta T, Nogi Y, Kadowaki A, et al. Relationship between Burnout and Mental-Illness-Related Stigma among Nonprofessional Occupational Mental Health Staff. BioMed Res Int. 2019.

11.      Endriulaitienė A, Žardeckaitė-Matulaitienė K, Pranckevičienė A, Markšaitytė R, Tillman DR, Hof DD. Self-Stigma of seeking help and job burnout in mental health care providers: the comparative study of Lithuanian and the USA samples. J Workplace Behav Health. 2019;34(2):129-48.

12.      Konlan KD, Asampong E, Dako-Gyeke P, Glozah FN. Burnout syndrome among healthcare workers during COVID-19 pandemic in Accra, Ghana. PloS one. 2022;17(6):e0268404.

13.      Bianchi R, Laurent E, Schonfeld IS, Bietti LM, Mayor E. Memory bias toward emotional information in burnout and depression. J Health Psychol. 2020;25(10-11):1567-75.

14.      Al Saif F, Al Shakhoori H, Nooh S, Jahrami H. Association between attitudes of stigma toward mental illness and attitudes toward adoption of evidence-based practice within health care providers in Bahrain. Plos One. 2019;14(12):e0225738.

15.      Claponea RM, Pop LM, Iorga M, Iurcov R. Symptoms of burnout syndrome among physicians during the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic—a systematic literature review. InHealthcare 2022 May 25 (Vol. 10, No. 6, p. 979). MDPI.

16.      Schonfeld IS, Verkuilen J, Bianchi R. An exploratory structural equation modeling bi-factor analytic approach to uncovering what burnout, depression, and anxiety scales measure. Psychol Assess. 2019;31(8):1073.

17.      Ahmad W, Ashraf H, Talat A, Khan AA, Baig AA, Zia I, et al. Association of burnout with doctor–patient relationship and common stressors among postgraduate trainees and house officers in Lahore—a cross-sectional study. PeerJ. 2018;6:e5519.

18.      Waheed K, Liaqat N, Ejaz S, Khanum A, Ijaz S, Butt A, et al. Burnout among gynaecological residents in lahore, Pakistan: A cross-sectional survey. Age. 2017;27(1.69).

19.      Kamran R, Bari A, Zaheer N, Shahbaz M, Aslam K, Yasser F, et al. Prevalence of Burnout among Dentists in CMH Lahore Medical College & Institute of Dentistry, Pakistan. AdvBiores. 2020;11(6):164-9.

20.      Panagioti M, Geraghty K, Johnson J, Zhou A, Panagopoulou E, Chew-Graham C, et al. Association Between Physician Burnout and Patient Safety, Professionalism, and Patient Satisfaction A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. JAMA. 2018;178(10):1317-30.

21.      Talih F, Warakian R, Ajaltouni J, Shehab AAS, Tamim H. Correlates of Depression and Burnout Among Residents in a Lebanese Academic Medical Center: a Cross-Sectional Study. Acad Psychiatry. 2016;40:38-45.

22.      Sachdeva A, Nandini H, Kumar V, Chawla RK, Chopra K. From stress to stigma–mental health considerations of health care workers involved in COVID19 management. Indian J Tuberc. 2022;69(4):590-5.

23.      Koutra K, Mavroeides G, Triliva S. Mental Health Professionals’ Attitudes Towards People with Severe Mental Illness: Are they Related to Professional Quality of Life? Community Ment Health J. 2022:1-12.

24.      Abdalla R, Ansari S, Hurley M, Attarian H, Fargen K, Hirsch J, et al. Correlation of call burden and sleep deprivation with physician burnout, driving crashes, and medical errors among US neurointerventionalists. Am J Neuroradiol. 2022;43(9):1286-91.

25.      Ekingen E, Teleş M, Yıldız A, Yıldırım M. Mediating effect of work stress in the relationship between fear of COVID-19 and nurses' organizational and professional turnover intentions. Arch Psychiatr Nurs. 2023;42:97-105.

26.      Holmberg M, Hammarbäck S, Andersson H. Registered nurses’ experiences of assessing patients with mental illness in emergency care: A qualitative descriptive study. Nord J Nurs Res. 2020;40(3):151-61.

27.      Pelayo-Terán J, Zapico-Merayo Y, Llamas MG, Vega-García S, López-Zapico C, Villa-Carcedo M, et al. Factors associated to stigma in mental health workers of Castilla y Leon. The role of burnout and work motivation. Eur Psychiatry. 2022;65(S1):S689-S90.