Doctor fatigue a rising concern in Tanzania's hospitals

Dar es Salaam. A recent study has found that there was a growing trend in burnout among Tanzania physicians and medical service providers.

Dubbed ‘Risk factors for physician burnout: a perspective from Tanzania’ that was carried by Bugando Catholic University of Health and Allied Sciences (BCUHAS) noted that the challenge averaged at 67 percent.

The study outlines factors leading to increased trend to dissatisfaction with career choice, considering switching institutions, working in an urban settings, inadequate emergencies/leave coverage and financial challenges.

However, these are crosscutting factors across the country with the majority of medical doctors experiencing fatigue due to different reasons including inadequate number of specialists as well as working in multiple healthcare facilities to improve their daily income.

Speaking to The Citizen, *Dr Emmanuel Lyanga (not his real name), a gynaecologist at the Muhimbili National Hospital (MNH) said he attends over 40 patients a day in two hospitals.

According to him, his day starts at 5.30am and ends at 11pm and sometimes it goes beyond in case of emergencies.

Furthermore, he says, the situation has been like that for over ten years now, despite his happiness that the job provides him with relatively enough money.

Missing social interaction and living in fatigue are major challenges in service delivery.

“Working in such condition might result to medical errors such as making wrong prescription, misdiagnosis and erroneous surgeries. The government should employ more doctors and give the opportunity for patients to receive good treatment,” said Dr Lyanga.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) reports that a doctor to patient ratio in Tanzania stands at 1:20,000, instead of the recommended 1:8,000.

For his part, Medical Association of Tanzania (MAT) president Shadrack Mwaibambe said working for over 8 hours a day was wrong in any field.

According to him, the practice is highly discouraged in the medical career as doctors are supposed to work 40 hours only in five days. “Overworking denies doctor’s with the opportunity to provide better services to patients. They will not be productive and utilize their skills at 100 percent,” he said.

This kills the art of medicine and the patient might miss his right to be listened to as requited and being given an opportunity to contribute on the kind of treatment she or he wants to receive,” added Dr Mwaibambe.

He said the private sector should expand its services and employ more doctors who will provide better treatment instead of scrambling for a few professionals employed in public healthcare facilities.

“The private sector should also create friendly working environment that will attract more doctors” he said.

He said the country has 22,000 professional doctors, noting that only 8,000 to 12,000 are practicing, wondering the whereabouts of the remaining.

According to him, about 3,000 medics (at various levels of education) enter the employment market annually, hinting that only some of them are absorbed by the public and private healthcare facilities.

The head of paediatric surgical unit at the MNH, Dr Zaitun Bokhary said her working years she never worked at another hospital after routine duties.

She is of the view that doing so was unfair to herself and the family to spend more time at work, considering that she is also a mother and a wife.

“MNH has a huge workload, where I usually work from 7am to 5pm. It is difficult to have time for other patients outside the facility,” she said.

Furthermore, she has been forced to take a one week trip with her family for relaxation at the national park, asking others to follow the trend.