The physician at risk: disruptive behaviour, burnout, addiction, and suicide

Excerpt

Physician, heal thyself

Luke 4:23

The Journal has published an annual special theme issue in February of each year since 2011. Topics for these issues are carefully chosen after thoughtful discussions with the Journal editorial board and are informed by discussions with colleagues throughout the country and beyond. This year’s compilation revolves around the complex and often interrelated issues of disruptive behaviour, burnout, addiction, and suicide. Although these are arguably somewhat sombre topics, we view them as necessary to begin conversations that will build and maintain the resilience, health, and professionalism of our specialty. This cluster of topics represents a departure from our usual theme issues whose content addresses more quantitative, scientific, and clinical matter. Indeed, our past two theme issues on Enhanced Recovery After Surgery1 and patient-centred outcome measures2 have focused firmly on patient experience. …