Positive affectivity is a moderately stable trait over time and situation involving frequent feelings of pleasant mood, enthusiasm, and high energy. Positive affectivity is strongly linked to genetics, and unfortunately, only seen in a minority of the population. Contrary to positive affectivity, positive emotions include pleasant or desirable situational responses, ranging from interest and contentment […]
Outstanding Healthcare Teams, Part ll
There is no doubt that an effectively functioning healthcare team, in all healthcare settings, can decrease medical errors, improve communication between healthcare providers, empower patients to participate in their own care, facilitate early problem solving, and decrease the cost of care. However, the key to a successful team lies in its process. Physicists tell us […]
Outstanding health care teams
The Spirited Multidisciplinary Healthcare Team Healthcare is a high stress work setting where professional burn out is common. Burnt out physicians and healthcare workers lose focus on tasks at hand and withdraw from engagement with others; they project their frustration and anger on their colleagues. The result is relationships that lack professionalism and divide the […]
Meaning in a doctor’s life
I felt accomplished as Chair of Psychiatry for a large 4-hospital health network (and the first female to hold a Chairman position), the head of a happy family (myself and my 2 young autistic children), and a health nut in top physical condition. The fact that over the past several years I had been suffering […]
The value of resiliency training for residents
Once I gave a one-hour lecture to the resident physicians at a local University Health Network in positive psychology and resilience. Residency is a high-risk time in a physician’s career for depression, stress, and burnout. I chose to focus my talk on resilience. Doctors tend to deny their problems and are very adept with intellectualization. […]
Most doctors have low self-esteem
Most individuals who choose to become physicians in the US come from dysfunctional families. They tend to have low self-esteem. However, they often function in the role of “rescuer” or “the successful child” and that is how they get any recognition at all. Because of their background they feel it is their duty to continue […]
What happened to me
I am a medical doctor in Pennsylvania. My specialty is psychiatry and I have been actively involved in the Physicians’ Health field since 1991, dealing primarily with depression and burnout in doctors. In 2002 I developed a severe illness that gradually rendered me unable to walk. Over the next two years I saw multiple doctors […]
What I believe
I was a nurse before I was a doctor. My undergraduate degree in nursing was from a top academic university in the U.S. From the very beginning, the emphasis was on the relationship between the nurse and the patient, the patient’s emotional reaction to illness, and the nurse’s emotional reaction to caring for an individual […]