Home Research Senior House Officer Work Experience and Professional Development – A Study

Senior House Officer Work Experience and Professional Development – A Study

008

Why It Matters

There is a large body of research showing that the personal wellbeing of doctors plays an important role in the quality and safety of patient care.

Doctors with higher levels of mental wellbeing have a greater capacity to empathise with their patients.

An important aspect of physician wellbeing is work engagement.

However, in recent decades we have seen a decline in job satisfaction levels among doctors, most notably among those in the early stages of their careers.

While we have been able to identify reasons for this decline in satisfaction levels, there is a lack of information on the factors that lead to physician wellbeing and work engagement.

This study will give us a valuable insight into the factors that play a role in the long-term career success of our trainees.

Doctor reading patient notes.

Study Methods

Researchers have collected data from trainees in the early and middle stages of Basic Specialist Training and have been following their experiences as they progress through their training programme.

In total we have a sample of 402 trainee doctors who have shared their experiences about their trainers, teams, stress and plans for the future.

Our long-term ambition is to map a small cohort over a longer period of time, as they progress through training and become specialists.

Meet the Researchers

This project is being led by Dr Yseult Freeney, Lecturer in Organisational Psychology, Dublin City University, and Dr Martin Fellenz, School of Business, Trinity College Dublin.

Contact Us

If you would like more information about this study, please contact us.

Dr Lucia Prihodova

Manager, Research Department

Tel: +353 1 863 9645

Dr Lucia Prihodova is the Research Manager at the at the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland. Lucia’s research focuses on psychosocial, medical and health-care system determinants of long term health outcomes. Lucia has a PhD from the Faculty of Medicine at University of Groningen, Netherlands and is an author and co-author of 15 journal articles in the area of chronic diseases.  

RCPI Research

RCPI Research

Tel: +353 1 863 9700