As they prioritize the needs of others, many physicians overlook their own mental well-being. As one Sermo member and family medicine doctor says, “Mental health care is very important in medical training and practice because we go through a lot of mental stress.”
A growing body of literature associates mindfulness with positive personal and professional outcomes. It’s a practical way that physicians can prioritize themselves—and foster better care along the way.
Let’s explore the literature surrounding mindfulness in healthcare, including its benefits, its techniques and what members of the medical community say about it.
Mindfulness for healthcare professionals: An overview
Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) involve a range of therapeutic methods. Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) are two of the most common:
- MBSR: This eight-week program includes various mindfulness meditation techniques, including body scans (referring to mentally scanning and closely paying attention to the body), yoga and breathing exercises. Beyond enhancing general well-being, clinicians use MBSR to treat both psychiatric and somatic conditions. It’s also a common part of chronic illness treatment.
- MBCT: MBCT is another eight-week program that combines cognitive therapy and mindfulness. Its objective is to help people address and disengage from negative thought patterns, particularly in the context of depression and anxiety.
Mindfulness is about more than weeks-long MBIs. It also includes easily adoptable day-to-day practices, like breathing exercises and journaling. All address prevalent symptoms of burnout among physicians—exhaustion, depersonalization and lack of efficacy. Beyond their significant personal toll, these symptoms reduce physicians’ ability to provide care quality and increase malpractice risk, among other consequences that further exacerbate burnout.
Physicians need to prioritize their well-being—not just for themselves but for their patients. As one family medicine doctor and Sermo member says, “If health personnel are not in good mental health, patients cannot be cared for as they need.”
Why is mindfulness useful in healthcare?
Approximately half of all physicians experience burnout. It has several causes, including long working hours, inconsistent call duties and administrative burdens. While these causes are highly consequential in and of themselves, physicians also face barriers to care.
A global Sermo study of 180 physicians found that 34% would feel more confident seeking care if they were assured they would face no professional repercussions. But 48% said they would utilize mental health support that their employer or a member organization provides. An even greater number of physicians (79%) said addressing burnout needs to be a priority in healthcare. As one Sermo member’s comment reflects: “Mental health is paramount for physicians in their pursuit of delivering quality healthcare and preventing burnout.”
5 benefits of mindfulness in healthcare
For physicians, MBIs can yield greater self-compassion, improved relationships and refined workload management.
To experience these benefits, one Sermo member, a U.S.-based cardiologist, offers this encouragement: “Take regular breaks throughout the day to rest and recharge—simply stepping away from work for a few minutes. Make time for self-care activities that help you relax and unwind, such as exercise, meditation or hobbies.”
Here are more ways mindfulness improves physicians’ lives:
1. Reduced emotional reactivity
MBIs help physicians recognize, monitor and effectively manage their emotions. Healthcare MBI participants report reduced emotional reactivity and increased tolerance for uncertainty in both personal and professional contexts.
2. Greater self-compassion
The culture of perfectionism in medicine can cost physicians their well-being. Instead, they can use mindfulness to prioritize self-care and practice greater self-compassion, adopting healthier mindsets and routines.
3. Enhanced communication
As burnout yields depersonalization, MBIs help physicians to be present with their patients. One study respondent notes, “I find myself more present with clients and less reactionary to what clients are saying and feeling.” Another noted being able to better tend to difficult patient cases.
4. Improved relationships
Healthy personal and professional relationships are core determinants of reported happiness and career satisfaction among physicians. Personally, MBIs help physicians improve their relationships with their family and friends. And professionally, physicians might feel less irritated by their peers and ultimately more connected to their working communities.
5. Improved workload management
In a culture of overcommitment, MBIs help physicians increase their capacity to slow down and better manage their workloads. This increased capacity improves work productivity rather than decreasing it.
The role of individual and collective mindfulness in healthcare
Personal mindfulness efforts are limited if an organization fails to adopt collective mindfulness and sensemaking practices. Think of collective mindfulness as a healthcare organization’s shared capacity to notice, interpret and respond to small details—particularly unexpected ones.
Researchers Weick and Sutcliffe lay the foundation for a collective mindfulness framework that remains central to contemporary high-reliability practices. They identified five complementary collective mindfulness principles.
The first three principles strengthen an organization’s capacity to anticipate, detect and interpret unexpected events.
- Preoccupation with failure: This refers to ongoing vigilance in noticing and acting on small deviations or near-misses, treating them as indicators of potential systemic flaws.
- Reluctance to simplify: Staff seek multiple perspectives to fully understand complexities rather than relying on easy, narrow explanations.
- Sensitivity to operations: Sensitivity to operations is about maintaining a real-time, “big picture” of understanding interconnected systems. This understanding functions to anticipate and address potential risk.
The final two focus on proactive management and containment of emerging issues, preventing escalation into accidents or harm.
- Commitment to resilience: Teams build the capabilities necessary to adapt, recover and learn from unexpected events.
- Deference to expertise: Deference to expertise refers to flexibility in an organization’s structure. It grants decision-making power to those with the most relevant expertise, regardless of hierarchy.
These five processes form an interdependent system—one sustained by feedback and learning. While the literature is developing, it indicates that healthcare organizations that adopt collective mindfulness improve patient care, increase cost savings and notably enhance organizational resilience.
3 daily reflections for healthcare workers
By reflections, we aren’t referring to encouraging words for healthcare workers. Affirmations have their place, yet aren’t a core part of common MBIs. Instead, these MBIs—like MBSR and MBCT—involve active reflective practices. These include:
- Journaling: This simple discipline decreases mental distress and improves reported general well-being. The literature indicates that journaling supports cognitive reappraisal, hence its role in MBIs.
- Three-minute breathing space: In MBCT, participants engage in the “breathing space”—a process similar to meditation. The three-minute practice has three stages: Awareness, gathering and expanding. Participants identify and expand their thoughts, focus on breathing rhythm and widen awareness of the body as a whole.
- Body scans: Body scans are most common in MBSR. It asks participants to become aware of their bodies, beginning at the head and working down to the toes. Like the breathing space, MBSR emphasizes being non-judgmental during body scans.
Literature associates these simple MBI practices with improved sleep quality, reduced stress, decreased burnout and other benefits that influence well-being. Physicians can use them to prioritize their mental and physical health—for them, and their patients.
Join an online global community of 1+ million physicians
Sermo surveyed 180 physicians worldwide to identify resources they believe would benefit HCPs experiencing burnout. Over 20% expressed a desire for an online community, while 10% indicated a preference for access to peer support groups.
It’s important to have a group of peers who know the nuanced challenges of the medical field. That’s why Sermo has created the largest online community of physicians. It’s a space where doctors speak with each other on the topics that matter to them and their patients—with a few laughs along the way.
Gain support and become a Sermo member today.
