The Centers for Disease Control and The World health Organization both have statements regarding burnout. Here is the official statement from the CDC .
“Burnout is an “occupational phenomenon”, rather than a medical condition or actual disease (according to the International Classification of Diseases, 11th revision or ICD-11).
-Although burnout is not an official medical condition, it is an important and increasingly common phenomenon that needs to be intentionally addressed.
To understand current research and practice involving burnout, it is helpful to understand a bit of this phenomenon’s history:
- From early conceptualizations, burnout was a work-related condition believed to affect workers in helping and/or service professions.
- Interestingly, the earliest known examination of burnout was with public health workers staffing free medical clinics in the 1960s.
- In the years since, research has shown that burnout can happen in a wide variety of work and work-related settings (Bianchi et al., 2014).
- The boundaries between work and other parts of our lives are not always clear cut. But we do have to start somewhere – so thinking about burnout as a condition caused by work can be a meaningful starting point.”
I like the word “occupation” used here and I will use it as I do with occupational therapy. Occupations are how you occupy your time. Many studies came after COVID with healthcare worker burn out. And if most of our time is occupied by caregiving or advocating for basic human rights of another individual, there is burn out.
I am there. I have gotten to cynical phase especially with Florida. How does this get better? Is another state or country for that matter better? Most local reps have blocked my number at this point and quite frankly do not care. I have backed way out on seeing my own clients in private practice. Burn out is real and have no idea how to fix it.
Just be a kind human please.