Burnout is rampant among female health care workers. Here’s why

Health care workers — and particularly female health care workers — are burning out at alarming rates.  

A recent survey from nursing marketplace platform ShiftKey shared with The Hill found that 86 percent of women in the field — including nurses, nurse practitioners, physician assistants and technicians — reported experiencing burnout, with 64 percent saying they were at risk of burning out “right now.”  

The rates were notably lower for men, though still high: 66 percent of male health care workers said they have experienced burnout and 55 percent said they were at risk of burning out right now.    

Female nurses were also more likely to say they have considered leaving the field, with 53 percent saying so compared to 32 percent of their male counterparts.    

A variety of health care workers took part in ShiftKey’s survey, a company spokesperson told The Hill. Physicians were not included.  

Other research also shows that women in health care — including doctors — experience higher rates of burnout than men.    

The American Medical Association released data last year showing 57 percent of female physician and non-physician health care providers reported experiencing burnout in 2022.    

Meanwhile, 47 percent of male physicians and non-physician health care providers said the same.    

Researchers at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences Resiliency & Well-Being Center found a similar disparity in an analysis released last month of 71 studies from 26 different countries published between 1979 and 2022 on health care worker well-being.   

All of the studies reviewed included responses from women between 18 and 74 years old who then worked in different roles in healthncare, including as a physician, nurse, clinical social worker or mental health provider.  

The analysis found that women working in health care “endure a significantly higher level of stress and burnout compared to their male counterparts.”   

Researchers determined that gender inequity and a lack of autonomy in the workplace and poor work-life balance contributed to the higher burnout rates among women.    

Kate Benoit, a 52-year-old licensed practical nurse (LPN) typically based in Austin, Texas, said that all three of these factors played a role in her almost burning out four years ago.    

Benoit has worked as a full-time LPN — or a nurse who provides basic medical care under the supervision of registered nurses and doctors — for decades while also taking care of her three children as a single mother.    

In 2020, she was routinely being asked to take on more shifts or work extra days, Benoit said, like so many other health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

But the extra work continued even as the pandemic waned, and Benoit said the hospital she worked for began to give its nursing staff more patients to attend to per shift without increasing pay or vacation time.    

On top of this, she said her employer did not facilitate much work-life balance. For example, Benoit said, she was scheduled for almost every holiday because her children were older, and she was routinely denied personal days to attend family functions.    

She said she was also met with pushback if she requested a day off work to deal with issues concerning her disabled son.    

“I just felt like I was being taken advantage of,” she said.    

“I did get close to burnout because I was dealing with the stress of raising a family, paying the bills that went up every year, and dealing with an employer who basically froze the pay for their nursing staff while increasing the number of residents per nurse,” she said.    

While this is the experience of many nurses regardless of gender, Benoit told The Hill that she believes there is indeed a difference in the amount of stress male nurses and female nurses tend to endure.    

And she thinks this gender imbalance is linked to the fact that women tend to take on more household and familial responsibilities than men.   

“A lot of the male nurses I’ve met seem to be able to do these long, extended work weeks for a long period of time without getting burnt out,” Benoit said adding that women appear to need at least some decompression time after working nonstop for a week or weeks.    

“That seven-day work week is very hard for us to maintain since as far as child care, childrearing and even intervening with adult children’s issues, we seem to be the primary caregiver,” she said.   

Leigh Frame, executive director of the George Washington University’s Office of Integrative Medicine and Health and associate director of the Resiliency & Well-Being Center, said that women in general are under “tremendous” pressure to succeed both at home and on the job.  

And health care workplaces can amplify this stress that is felt by women across the country due to the long hours, multiple shifts and the family responsibilities that fall on them, she added.    

“Human beings are not equipped to handle the combined, intense pressures in health care in part due to the pressure to not take time to care for yourself,” Frame said.