Workplace-related stress among physicians in Mongolia: A cross-sectional study

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Sukhee Erdenetuya
Sovd Tugsdelger
Yoshitoku Yoshida
Junichi Sakamoto
Nobuyuki Hamajima

Abstract





Mongolia faces challenges in health sector human resource development. Every year 4-5% of all physicians change their employment place within the health sector, and another 3-4% leave their jobs for reasons other than retirement. To date, no thorough analysis of occupational stress among physicians has been conducted despite the fact that workplace-related stress could be one of the key reasons for staff shortags in the health sector. This study was conducted to assess physicians’ workplace-related stressors in Mongolia, using Occupational Stress Index for Physicians (OSI-MD).


In total, 219 physicians (179 females and 40 males) participated in the study. The participants were classified into three groups: 1) physicians in the surgical field; 2) other physicians involved in patient care, and 3) physicians not involved in direct patient care. An analysis of variance was used for a comparison of the stress scores among the groups.


Physicians involved in patient care had a higher total score for the aspects of “high demand”, “strictness”, and “extrinsic time pressure” than physicians not involved in direct patient care (p<0.05, p<0.01, and p<0.05, respectively). Physicians in the surgical field had a higher total score for “noxious exposure” and “threat avoidance” than other physicians (p<0.01 and p<0.01, respectively). Physicians aged 50 years and over had a lower total score than ones (p<0.05).


The present study demonstrated high occupational stress burden among physicians in Mongolia. The study further documented differences in workplace-related stressors among various physician groups and different levels of occupational stress burden according to the physician’s age.





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Author Biographies

Sukhee Erdenetuya

Department of Public Administration and Management, Ministry of Health, Mongolia, Young Leaders’ Program, Nagoya University Graduate School of Medicine, Nagoya 466- 8550, Japan

Sovd Tugsdelger

Department of Public Health Policy Implementation, Ministry of Health, Mongolia

Yoshitoku Yoshida

Young Leaders’ Program, Nagoya University Graduate School of Medicine, Nagoya 466- 8550, Japan

Junichi Sakamoto

Young Leaders’ Program, Nagoya University Graduate School of Medicine, Nagoya 466- 8550, Japan

Nobuyuki Hamajima

Department of Preventive Medicine/Biostatistics and Medical Decision Making, Nagoya University Graduate School of Medicine, Nagoya 466-8550, Japan