New Delhi: According to recent research by doctors, the more hours a person works in a demanding job per week, the more likely he is to develop depression.
A threefold change in depressive symptom scores was associated with working 90 or more hours per week as compared to working 40 to 45 hours per week.
In addition, compared to those who worked fewer hours, a greater proportion of those who worked multiple hours had scored high enough to be diagnosed with moderate to severe depression, which is severe enough to require medical attention.
The University of Michigan-based research team employed sophisticated statistical techniques to simulate a randomized clinical trial while accounting for many other aspects of doctors’ personal and professional lives.
The researchers found a correlation between the number of hours worked, with an average symptom increase of 1.8 points on a standard scale for those working 40 to 45 hours, and going up to 5.2 points for those working more than 90 hours. Discovered the “dose-response” relationship. Depressive symptoms. They come to the conclusion that, of all the stress that affects doctors, working too many hours is a significant factor in depression.
The team from the University of Michigan’s Institute of Academic Medicine, Michigan Medicine, reports their findings in the New England Journal of Medicine after examining 11 years of data on more than 17,000 first-year medical residents. The recently graduated physicians were undergoing training in several hospitals across the country.
This information has come from the Intern Health Study of the Michigan Neuroscience Institute and the Eisenberg Family Depression Center. Each year, the project enlists new graduates from medical schools to participate in a year-long tracking of their depressed symptoms, working hours, sleep and other factors as they complete their first year of residency, also known as the intern year. is called.
Effect of high number of working hours
The study comes as major national organizations, such as the National Academy of Medicine and the Association of American Medical Colleges, grapple with how to address the high rates of depression among physicians, physicians-training and other health professionals. Although interns in the study reported a wide range of previous week’s work hours, the most common work hour levels were between 65 and 80 hours per week.
Resident work weeks are currently limited to 80 hours by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, which establishes national standards for residency programs. However, it can average over a maximum of four weeks and there may be exceptions. Additionally, the ACGME places restrictions on how many days in succession and how long a shift can last for residents. Studies of the effects of these restrictions on resident welfare and patient safety hazards have produced conflicting results.
According to the authors, their findings suggest that there is a definite need to significantly cut down on the normal hours that residents work each week.
Amy Bohnert, PhD, of the study, says, “This analysis strongly suggests that reducing the average number of hours worked increases interns’ depressive symptoms over time, and reduces the number of people who develop diagnosable depression.” She goes.” Senior author and professor at UM Medical School. “The important thing is that people work fewer hours; you can more effectively deal with the stress or frustration of your job when you have more time to recover.”
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