How To Prevent Burnout: A Case in Point. Frederick This One.

By MARTIN A. SAMUELS I posted an essay on The Health Care Blog (entitled The Prevention of Physician Burnout: A Nine Step Program. Here is an example of how this works. Recall the wonderful children’s book by Leo Lionni, Frederick. Let me remind you of it. A family of mice begins to store away food and supplies for the long winter ahead.  Most are practical and gather corn, grains, and straw. One of the mice, Frederick, instead collects rays of sun, colors of the rainbow, and words to remember.  When winter arrives the family begins to use up their practical supplies.  They become irritable and angry and don’t have anything to talk about.  In other words, they become burned out. Frederick shares his stores of sun rays, colors, and a poem which enlivens their spirits and saves their lives. Ever since reading this story to my own children I have used Frederick as a verb. When a wonderful event occurs, I try to remember to Frederick it…….and save it for a tough day. About a month ago, a 20 year old woman, previously completely healthy, began to experience twitching of her left hand. Over several days this involuntary jerking worsened and spread to involve the left side of the face as well. Her parents told us that her personality had dramatically changed in that she lost her usual ebullient nature and became almost inert and unreactive. She came to us where it appeared that she was suffering from epilepsia partialis continua (continuous partial seizures). The MR...
Source: The Health Care Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Source Type: blogs