Kieren Green, who seems to have strangely, given his surname, taken a dislike to The Green Man website (see previous post), suggests that The Green Man shift his focus to theology.

The site isn't a theological site however religion and spirituality does crop up from time to time and, accordingly, The Green Man will take Kieren's, somewhat acerbic, suggestion and venture into the domain of spirituality.

We are all, of course, aware that physicians are appalling at healing themselves and one area where this is particularly true in the area of depressive incidents. Depression is at plague proportions within the medical community with upwards of 20% of interns suffering major and frequent depressive incidents. This is presumeably one of the most significant contributing factors to the epidemic of substance abuse amongst the medical profession. Research in this area indicates that 15% of interns exhibit pathological misuse of alcohol whilst another study found 11.4% of physicians had used benzodiazepines in the past year in an unsupervised fashion and 17.6% had engaged in unsupervised use of opioids.

A study by University of Cincinatti which appears in the March-April 2006 edition of Ambulatory Pediatrics, found that 25 percent of 227 primary-care residents surveyed reported a number of symptoms associated with depression such as irritability, sense of isolation and hopelessness, and fear.

Work has been done in an attempt to address this by limiting the excessive hours that these young doctors work however it seems to have had little or no impact on the incidence of depression.

So how does this relate to spirituality? Well I am glad you asked. The research shows risk for significant depressive symptoms was greater among respondents who reported negative religious coping mechanisms, poorer spiritual well-being and the need for more spiritual support. This may by correlative and not causal. Doctors who have trouble coping also have trouble dealing with their spirituality.

The bit of the conclusion that most intrigued The Green Man however was this statement

Mood or other psychological problems among primary-care residents, or any other health-care provider for that matter, could negatively affect patient care

I think we have the crux of the problem in this one statement. We don't give a bugger about the wellbeing of the doctors except in as much as it affects patient care. Perhaps if we started treating them as people with needs, wants and insecurities all of their own we may take significant steps forward in the solving the problem.

Read more here. and here.