Burnout among Nigerian Doctors: A Systematic Review

Abstract

Burnout among physicians is a global phenomenon which has been under-reported in middle and low-income economies. The importance of burn-out on the physicians' well-being, patient care and overall health care system cannot be overemphasized. In Nigeria, few studies are specific to burnout, with most of the available studies exploring psychosocial issues at physicians' workplace stress and job dissatisfaction. This present review of literature is assessing burnout among Nigerian Physicians. This review is designed using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis (PRISMA) guidelines. The review identified observational, review, longitudinal and experimental studies on Nigerian physicians between 1970- 2017, which have the full text in the English language. The articles were searched from online databases such as PUBMED, Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), African Journals Online (AJOL) and Google Scholar by researchers. The keywords used include “Physician”, “Nigeria”, “burn-out” syndrome. The prevalence of 23.6% to 51.7% burnout was reported among physicians in the selected studies, with young age being a strong predictor for burnout. High burden of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and personal accomplishment were reported in the study carried out among resident doctors who are early career doctors. The prevalence of burnout reported from these studies in Nigeria is very high, although they are within the globally reported range of physician burnout. Nevertheless, there is a dearth of information on the subject matter among Nigerian Physicians. There is a need to carry out more studies on burnout among Nigerian Physicians.

Keywords: Burnout, Doctors, Nigeria, Physician