Burnout among physicians is not anecdotal. It’s documented and persistent.
According to a recent Commonwealth Fund survey more than 2 in 5 U.S. primary care physicians (43 percent) report experiencing burnout, the highest rate among 10 countries surveyed. The survey adds to the growing body of research on physician and nurse burnout and its impact on patient care and outcomes and the increasing healthcare workforce shortage.
The new findings, drawn from nearly 11,000 physicians worldwide, point to a consistent conclusion: burnout is being driven far more by system friction than by patient complexity.
Among U.S. physicians reporting burnout:
- Nearly 70 percent reported dissatisfaction with workload and work-life balance
Burnout Is a System Failure, Not a Resilience Gap
These findings reinforce a critical truth: burnout is not about clinicians failing to cope. It’s about care models that rely on overextension as a baseline operating strategy.
When clinicians are routinely expected to absorb coverage gaps after hours, navigate excessive documentation and insurance processes, and compensate for staffing shortages with longer days and more call, burnout becomes predictable.
“Clinician burnout isn’t a personal issue; it’s a design issue. When systems depend on clinicians to stretch indefinitely to cover gaps, something eventually breaks,” said Access TeleCare Founder & Chief Strategy Officer, Chris Gallagher, M.D. “The answer isn’t asking clinicians to do more. It’s building care models that support them.”
The Commonwealth Fund’s recommendations echo this perspective, calling for reduced administrative burden, better workload alignment, and stronger leadership frameworks that reinforce clinicians’ sense of value.
Where Telemedicine Fits into Burnout Reduction
At Sullivan County Community Hospital, the burnout dynamic facing primary care physicians looked much like what the Commonwealth Fund survey describes. Family medicine physicians were responsible for full outpatient panels during the day while also covering hospitalized patients after hours, creating an unsustainable workload that strained both their outpatient practices and the hospital. When the hospital implemented Access TeleCare’s teleHospitalist program, inpatient coverage shifted to virtual hospitalists who functioned as a seamless extension of the on-site team and provided much needed relief for the community family medicine physicians.
This change allowed the family medicine physicians to focus on their practices, regain predictability in their schedules, and step back from overnight and weekend hospital coverage. The result was reduced physician burnout, and a care model that better supports inpatient and outpatient care availability in a rural setting.
Telemedicine is often discussed in terms of access or efficiency. Increasingly, it’s also a burnout mitigation strategy when implemented as a true extension of on-site teams.
At Access TeleCare, telemedicine is designed to redistribute workload without fragmenting care, particularly in hospitals where physician shortages persist.
Telemedicine can:
- Reduce overnight and weekend burden on in-person physicians by providing on-demand virtual coverage when and where it’s needed
- Shorten delays in getting specialty consults that increase length of stay and workload
- Support predictable and manageable schedules that make clinical careers sustainable
Burnout Prevention Requires Structural Change
The Commonwealth Fund data document that physicians are burning out because systems are asking them to carry problems that should be solved operationally.
Telemedicine alone isn’t the solution. But as part of a broader redesign of coverage and care delivery, it plays a meaningful role in reducing unnecessary strain on clinical teams.
Hospitals that treat burnout as a systems problem are better positioned to retain clinicians, stabilize care teams, and protect long-term access to care.
Ready to see how telemedicine can support your physicians and clinicians?
