- Curing patients brings a sense of satisfaction, but there is also a dark side to this profession.
- The profession of Medicine has the highest suicide rate in the world and even exceeds the average registered in the rest of the population.
- From the salary to the emotional exhaustion are some of the main disadvantages of being a doctor today.
On a daily basis, only the pleasant part of being a health professional is usually talked about. Helping in the recovery of patients generates an indescribable feeling and is the clearest sign that you can have a direct impact on people’s lives. At the same time, the other facet of the profession must be known because there are also several disadvantages of being a doctor
Despite the advances in technology, there is a profession that will never disappear and that is Medicine. Everything starts from the fact that no machine can transmit the empathy of a human. The warmth of a person is impossible to replicate and so far not even the most advanced equipment has the ability to mimic this characteristic.
On the other hand, as mentioned from the beginning, not everything in the field of health is perfect. There are also several disadvantages of being a doctor and they are the ones that cause the most common discomfort among the workers of this union. Below we share some of the main ones.
Increased risk of suicide
First you must start with a rather delicate but completely real subject. Being a doctor brings pride but it should also be considered a high-risk activity. Especially in recent years it has been found that physicians have a higher suicide rate than other professions.
Despite the fact that the main activity of doctors is to take care of the health of others, sometimes they forget about themselves. In the United States alone, the suicide rate in healthcare personnel is 28 to 40 per 100,000. While in the general population it is 14 per 100 thousand. With this, it can be seen that the risk is twice as high.
Too many activities to do
If you want a job where you can have free time then you should look elsewhere. During working days in hospitals there is always something to do. From patient care to filling out files takes too much time.
Health professionals, from the formative stage, suffer from constant pressure. First by their teachers and now in the workplace by their superiors and patients. Everyone demands the doctor and in the end that leads to having to live with constant stress.
Tendency to suffer Burnout Syndrome
Related to the previous point, Medicine is the profession with the highest rate of people with Burnout syndrome in the world. Faced with the pressure and the complexity of the activities, a large part of the doctors suffer from mental exhaustion, which in the first instance affects their own integrity. And as a consequence, by not feeling well they also have a greater risk of making mistakes and offering a poor service to patients.
The salary is not proportional to the importance of the activity
another of the disadvantages of being a doctor, especially in the Latin American region, is that the pay is too low. Although many years of study and training are required, in the end it is unfair to have to work for minimal pay.
One of the requirements to be a doctor is to have a vocation for service, although this should not be confused and think that work should be given as a gift. For this reason, one of the negative aspects of being a doctor in Mexico is that most receive too little pay compared to the importance of their activity. It cannot be generalized because there are exceptions that do obtain an attractive salary but there are many others that do not.
High risk of infections within hospitals
Due to the doctor’s own activities in his direct care of patients, he has a high risk of infections. Currently, this aspect is clearly observed due to the high percentage of health professionals who have been infected with Covid-19.
In addition, the SARS-CoV-2 virus is not the only one that represents a threat because there are also other equally dangerous ones such as HIV and hepatitis B. Maximum care must always be taken inside the hospital to avoid any type of mistake.
Also read:
The states with the lowest medical salaries in Mexico
Salary of doctors in Mexico: The 10 states that pay the best
Importance of Continuing Medical Education in doctors: Fundamental to access higher salaries
