The Burnout Syndrome Among Physician Assistants: A review of cross-sectional studies and guide to assist with stress

There have been numerous predicting factors of burnout, but three core components have been identified repeatedly including decreased personal accomplishment, emotional exhaustion, and depersonalization. This review aims to summarize the evidence burnout because when primary care Physician Assistants are pushed to mental or physical extremes their valued traits, such as altruism, perfectionism, and compassion decrease and negative consequences for patient care will increase. A primary prevention tool/guide to avoid burnout will be outlined in this review. The PubMed, Clinical Review, PLOS, JAAPA, AAPA, JAMA, and AAFP databases were searched without language restrictions but date restrictions for the last 5 years. Cross-sectional studies that analyzed burnout as the exposure condition were included. Among the 1663 articles initially identified, 33 fulfilled the inclusion criteria, and 2 were analyzed because they met the three core components of burnout and surveyed PAs only. Conflicting findings were observed. KEY WORDS: emotional exhaustion; burnout syndrome; depersonalization; burnout; physician assistant; primary care; decreased personal accomplishmen