Physician Wellness is Complicated and It's Simple

Jessie Mahoney, MD

The system is broken and needs fixing. We must change the culture to treat physicians and anyone working in health care as humans not superheroes. When we acknowledge our humanity, we enhance relationships, communication, quality and caring, we bring back the art of medicine as well as joy, meaning, purpose, passion, and fun.

As your fearless wellness warrior, this quarter I am opting to share a number of recent podcasts and YouTube videos on Physician Wellness. I hope you enjoy the opportunity to LISTEN and WATCH, as well as READ.

The Super Hero Cape Causes Harm: Healthy Physicians Are Humans Healing Humans

The vision of physicians as heroes was shared prominently during the covid pandemic. The cape analogy causes harm to many physicians.

Appreciation for our hard work is welcome but physicians, and nurses, and everyone who works in healthcare are humans first.

There should be human expectations of us and we need to have human expectations of ourselves.

Anything other than this is a recipe for burnout, exhaustion, and long-term disaster to our healthcare system.

We are stronger when we recognize our common humanity.

We are stronger when we acknowledge our fallibility.

We are stronger when we are a team and not expecting to hold back locomotives.

We are stronger when we see our lives as one without victims, villains, or superheroes.

The hero cape actually is a heavy burden for many.

The hero cape leads to isolation and pressure to control things out of our control.

We can do everything right and things will still go wrong because we, and our patients, are humans.

Take a listen to this Mindful Healers Podcast Episode to learn more by scanning the QR code with your smartphone:

Have you embodied a superhero persona as a physician?

What if you dropped the cape?

What thought patterns and habits do you practice that you were taught during training, but don't serve you anymore? Solving Complex Problems with Out of the Box Approaches

Many helpful well-being lessons can be learned from industries outside healthcare.

Perspectives outside of medicine are integral to solving the complex problem of physician burnout and creating a sustainable practice of medicine in the United States.

In this Mindful Healers Podcast episode, we share lessons from artificial intelligence, the military, interior design, virtual reality, photo-journalism, yoga, art, and nature about how to bring more sustainability and wellness into the practice of medicine.

Included are many insights from the Mindful MD/Teravana Foundation's Think Tank on Physician Well-Being held in June 2022. Take a listen to this Mindful Healers Podcast Episode by scanning the QR code with your smartphone:

Do No Harm to Yourself:

The harm we do to ourselves as physicians is unintentional. It is done in the name of serving others. And it is harmful nonetheless.

Caregiver wellness is a cultural problem in medicine and beyond. The pandemic has brought it to a crisis level. Burnout is super costly financially.

It impacts quality, access and service.

If caregivers are not healthy, we can’t provide great care.

Even if we can hold for a while, it's not sustainable for a long time.

Our broken system is a big part of the problem.

Our medical training, our expectations of ourselves and others, and our societal culture are also a part of the problem.

We are also part of the problem.

Our underlying thought patterns and natural tendencies, the exact ones that helped us successfully get through training and professional school make burnout worse. Then we are trained to think and behave in certain ways, in the name of service and care. We are told if we don’t do it this way, we don’t care about patients.

Take a listen to this talk I gave to my 1997 UCSF medical school class at our virtual reunion to learn more.

How to Responsibly Create Nourishing Healing and Well Spaces with Jennifer Downing

Listen to this podcast to enjoy a conversation about the intersection of beauty, space, nature, health and healing and optimal healing environments by scanning the QR code with your smartphone:

On Sunday, August 28th, SFMMS Physician Wellness Committee Chair, Dr. Jessie Mahoney led yoga and community building in the Celebration Garden of the San Francisco Botanical Garden in Golden Gate Park. Yoga was followed by socializing and community building between SFMMS physician colleagues. Special thanks to Dr. Mahoney for leading this event and the SF Botanical Garden for hosting SFMMS members.

Jessie Mahoney is a Pediatrician, a certified life coach for physicians, and a yoga instructor. She is the Chair of the SFMMS Physician Wellness Task Force. She practiced Pediatrics and was a Physician Wellness leader at Kaiser Permanente for 17 years. She is the founder of Pause and Presence Coaching where she supports and empowers her physician colleagues using mindfulness tools and mindset coaching. She specializes in helping ease career transitions and burnout, parenting struggles, and relationship challenges. She is a leader of the Mindful Healthcare Collective and is co-host of the Mindful Healers Podcast. She teaches virtual weekly yoga to physicians and other healthcare providers and leads yoga, coaching, and wellness retreats in spectacular natural locations. You can read her blog at www.jessiemahoneymd.com. You can connect with her at jessie@jessiemahoneymd.com.

Upcoming Wellness Opportunities

Mindful Yoga for Healers

A quarterly weekend offering of free Mindful Yoga for Healers. This is specifically for SFMMS members to join their colleagues in order to heal, replenish, restore, and connect! Sign up at https://mindfulyoga.jessiemahoneymd.com/ to be notified of class dates and times.

SFMMS Fall Book Club on November 3rd

The fall SFMMS book club will feature our most popular SFMMS Summer Reads, "Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the Language of Human Experience" by Brené Brown. To learn more and to register, visit our SFMMS Wellness page at www.sfmms.org/get-help/physician-wellness. To learn more about upcoming wellness events or to view recordings of past events, visit the SFMMS Wellness Page at www.sfmms.org/get-help/physicianwellness.

SFMMS WELLNESS EVENT HIGHLIGHTS

SFMMS Members Attend the Nocturnists’ Live Event in SF in June: TOGETHER AGAIN

Since 2016, the Nocturnists have uplifted the voices of over 350 healthcare workers through sold-out live performances and their acclaimed podcast. Their live performances help clinicians develop their stories for the stage, enabling them to speak publicly about the fears, doubts, joys, and passions that shape their personal and professional lives. With the generous support of the Nocturnists, SFMMS Wellness raffled tickets to our membership to "TOGETHER AGAIN," their live performance on the evening of Friday, June 10th at the Brava Theater in San Francisco. Attendees heard from 8 wonderful storytellers, each with a unique spin on the theme.

Mindful Yoga for Healers

A monthly weekend offering of free Mindful Yoga for Healers. This is specifically for SFMMS members to join their colleagues in order to heal, replenish, restore, and connect! Sign up at https://mindfulyoga.jessiemahoneymd.com/ to be notified of class dates and times.

Wellness Retreats

Back by popular demand, SFMMS Wellness raffled sponsorship for our members to attend one of three one-day retreats at Pie Ranch on either Sunday, June 12th, Thursday, June 23rd or Saturday, September 24th. The Honoring Diastole Wellness Retreats are led by SFMMS Wellness Committee Chair, Dr. Jessie Mahoney and SCCMA Physician Wellness Leader, Dr. Gail Wright of SCVMC Pediatric Cardiology. You can sign up and learn more here: https://www.jessiemahoneymd.com/honoring-diastole

“I was initially skeptical about the value of a day-long retreat - but this day was deeply therapeutic.”

– Chief Infectious Disease, TPMG

“Thank you for the most soul (and belly) nourishing program. It was just what I needed. The location was incredibly special. Truly a magical day.”

– Marin Endocrinologist

45-minute Intro Physician Coaching Session

What is physician coaching? Physician coaching is an evidence based intervention to decrease burnout and improve quality of life. (JAMA 2019) It is a safe space to explore your career and life frustrations, resentments, dreams and desires. It is preventive care for a sustainable and enjoyable career in medicine. It provides you with a toolbox of strategies to help you optimize your potential, productivity, and joy. It helps minimize stress and ease struggle. Professional athletes have coaches; physicians need them too. SFMMS Wellness raffled 45 minute intro coaching sessions with local, certified physician coach to our membership in June. We plan on raffling more opportunities like this to our membership in Fall 2022. If you are interested in learning more, please email Molly Baldridge, SFMMS Director of Engagement at mbaldridge@sfmms.org.

To view recordings of past events or to register for upcoming events, visit the SFMMS Wellness Page at www.sfmms.org/gethelp/physician-wellness.

SUMMER READS

Our Physician Wellness Committee curated an SFMMS Summer Reads list of books for Summer 2022. In lieu of an SFMMS book club meeting this summer, members were randomly selected to receive the Summer Reads book of their choice. You can still enjoy the following curated list this summer:

"Can't We Talk about Something More Pleasant?: A Memoir" by Roz Chast "The Conscious Parent: Transforming Ourselves, Empowering Our Children" by Dr. Shefali Tsabary "The Menopause Manifesto: Own Your Health with Facts and Feminism" by Dr. Jen Gunter "Things That Matter: Overcoming Distraction to Pursue a More Meaningful Life" by Joshua Becker "An Invitation to Pause... again: musings from a mindfulness coach about life and dementia" by Janet Archer "Life's Messy, Live Happy: Things Don't Have to Be Perfect for You to Be Content" by Cy Wakeman