F E ATU R E S T ORIES
EMOTIONAL SUPPORT ATTENDING
UND’s Department of Surgery initiates a new Surgical Resident Wellness Program
‘POSSIBLE IS NOT ENOUGH’ Co-director of resident wellness for the UND General Surgery Residency Program, Dr. Daniel Tuvin (center), with surgery residents in Fargo, N.D. Photo courtesy Dr. Daniel Tuvin.
“I entered medical school and surgery residency with some idea of what I was getting into, but even that couldn’t have prepared me,” says Dr. Alessandra Spagnolia, who grew up the daughter of two surgeons and was initially skeptical of a career in medicine because of the work hours her parents kept. “Surgery residency requires long hours and an efficiency that I still haven’t fully mastered. It keeps you away from friends, family, and special life events sometimes.”
“Burnout in the medical community, and in surgery specifically, is very real,” Spagnolia continues, referencing statistics like those from a 2018 study in the Journal of the American College of Surgery that reported “burnout” among surgery residents at an astounding 69%. “I have seen it in two forms: a transient ebb and flow that is somewhat normal, and a more chronic form that causes a person to drop out of residency, switch
Even so, says Spagnolia, it was these very factors—the
specialties, or worse. Regardless of the type, burnout has the
challenge of surgery—that eventually drew the third-year
potential for significant harm to our providers and patients.”
surgical resident to the field. 6
But the job is still stressful.
North Dakota Medicine Holiday 2021
