About this episode

The episode discusses mental health and wellbeing in the surgical workforce, highlighting key findings and systemic barriers while emphasizing the importance of self-care.

Join us as we discuss research on mental health and wellbeing in the surgical workforce with Drs. Yang and Collins. The episode explores key findings from recent national surveys showing that nearly one in seven surgeons report suicidal ideation in the past year, with depression, anxiety, and PTSD affecting 15–20% of the surgical population. The conversation highlights protective factors—professional fulfillment, resilience, self-valuation, and connection—while distinguishing between healthy resilience and normalized suffering. Dr. Yang and Dr. Collins discuss systemic barriers including time constraints, out-of-pocket mental health costs, and persistent stigma, alongside actionable institutional interventions: protecting dedicated wellbeing time, establishing peer support and psychological first aid programs, ensuring free mental health access, and expanding research to understand what helps surgeons thrive. The episode emphasizes that self-care is essential to patient safety and invites listeners to become advocates, engage with the literature, and help drive culture change within their institutions. For more information about the AAS wellbeing survey, please email Dr. Yang at…

People in this episode

Hosts: Steven Thornton, MD, Agnes Premkumar

Guests: Jeff Yang, MD, Reagan Collins, MD

Topics covered

• mental health
• wellbeing
• surgical workforce
• suicidal ideation
• resilience
• systemic barriers
• self-care

Keywords

• surgeons
• depression
• anxiety
• PTSD
• professional fulfillment
• peer support
• mental health access

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Massachusetts General Hospital, University of Pennsylvania, AAS

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