Secret Virginia Mental Health Services Saves Doctors From Burnout.

It’s no secret that physicians are reluctant to seek help when they feel they are struggling with their own mental health. While confidential support from the Physician Health Program (PHP) helps physicians in Virginia and across the US, physicians seeking care can sometimes benefit from more immediate resources.

In addition to fearing ostracism and harsh judgment from colleagues, many physicians worry that they will face rejection from medical boards or their employers if they seek help. Many worry that their mental health records could be found in court.

Medical Society of Virginia (MSV) executives have heard those concerns from hundreds of physicians and other clinicians in their state as they embark on a journey to build a program that provides low barriers to mental health care and health-related services. MSV was not intended to replace the state’s PHP, but rather to provide additional, confidential services.

MSV’s journey eventually led state lawmakers to unanimously pass a first-of-its-kind law in 2020 that created SafeHaven, a confidential resource. That’s a program administered by MSV where physicians can seek confidential help 24 hours a day, seven days a week to address work burnout or mental health issues. The law guarantees that information originating from SafeHaven is privileged.

Doctors can access counseling or peer support.

“This is one of the most important things the medical community has ever done, and it’s making a real difference for our physicians and their teams,” said Melina Davis, executive vice president and CEO of the medical community. “We believe that the two components – prevention and confidentiality, and the most experienced health care clinicians on the service side – are really important.”

The program has been so successful that the Virginia Legislature expanded SafeHaven in 2021 to include medical students, physician assistant students, nurses, nurse practitioners, nursing students, pharmacists and pharmacy students.

Reducing physician burnout is an important part of the problem AMA Recovery Plan for American Physicians.

Too many American physicians experience burnout. That is why AMA develops resources that prioritize safety and promote workflow changes. So physicians can focus on what matters: patient care.

The AMA recently updated its case brief, “Confidential care to support physician health and safety“ (PDF), which one It provides model legislative language and other recommended policy actions for states, as well as new resources for physicians and state medical associations.

Among the updates are new provisions from Arizona’s recently passed law to support physician safety. They include laws passed in Virginia, South Dakota and Indiana specifically intended to protect physicians seeking help with occupational fatigue and safety.

“Supporting the mental health and well-being of physicians and medical students is essential to supporting the health of our nation,” said the AMA president. Jack Resneck Jr., MD.

“Virginia’s Safehaven program shows that ensuring confidentiality and preventing professional consequences is filling a gap for senior physicians and other clinicians and students,” Davis said. “We strongly support our state’s PHP, but we also recognize the need to provide more open doors to confidential care. SafeHaven fits the bill.”

There are now more than 5,500 physicians and other clinics participating in the program.

Overall, only 1% of physicians nationally use physician health resources available to them. 3 to 4% of nurses use them and 6 to 7% of the general public use the resource.

“Our usage is 48% of all teams. It’s unbelievable,” Davis said.

Find out how states can Helping physicians get the confidential care they deserve.

Several physicians said they were grateful MSV leaders had someone to look up to, Davis said.

For one Virginia doctor, a confidential 30-minute peer-to-peer phone call with a doctor in Atlanta helped her stay in treatment.

The doctor caused several unvaccinated patients to die from complications of Covid-19 within two weeks. She used to ask those patients to get vaccinated before they got sick.

“Professionally, he crushed her,” Davis said. But “that coach helped her think about how she’s serving and how she’s helping families and how she’s helping patients. She called us back and said, ‘I spent 30 minutes on the phone with this coach and I believe she’s going to save my career. I can continue my practice.’

MSV administrators are looking for other services they can add to SafeHaven to support physicians, such as one that focuses on financial stress. They are also working with hospital managers to achieve a concrete commitment to tackling burnout. They are also working to eliminate language attached to state licensing requests that prevent physicians from claiming to have sought help.