Single item measures of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization are useful for assessing burnout in medical professionals.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Burnout has negative effects on work performance and patient care. The current standard for burnout assessment is the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), a well-validated instrument consisting of 22 items answered on a 7-point Likert scale. However, the length of the MBI can limit its utility in physician surveys.

Objective

To evaluate the performance of two questions relative to the full MBI for measuring burnout.

Design and participants

Cross-sectional data from 2,248 medical students, 333 internal medicine residents, 465 internal medicine faculty, and 7,905 practicing surgeons.

Measurements and main results

The single questions with the highest factor loading on the emotional exhaustion (EE) ("I feel burned out from my work") and depersonalization (D

SUBMITTER: West CP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2787943 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature