Academic faculty demonstrate higher well-being than residents: Pennsylvania anesthesiology programs' results of the 2017–2018 ACGME well-being survey

Study objective: Physician burnout and suicide are at epidemic proportions. There is very little data directly comparing resident versus faculty well-being. The 2017–2018 ACGME resident and faculty surveys mark the first time that well-being questions were included. The purpose of this study was to determine whether responses to ACGME well-being questions would differ significantly between anesthesiology residents and academic anesthesiology faculty. Design: 2017–2018 ACGME well-being survey responses. Setting: All eight Pennsylvania anesthesiology residency programs. Patients: None. Interventions: None. Measurements: The authors compared the 5-point Likert scale responses (1 = Never through 5 = Very Often) between residents (371/384 responses, 97%) and faculty (277/297 responses, 93%) for each of the twelve well-being questions. Responses were also dichotomized as being ≥4 versus <4 for categorical comparisons. Main results: Faculty responded higher than residents both by mean scores and percent of scores ≥ 4 for 6/12 questions (questions 1 (p < 0.001), 2 (p < 0.001), 4 (p < 0.001), 5 (p < 0.001), 8 (p < 0.001), and 11 (p = 0.001)). Residents responded categorically higher for question 9 (p = 0.022) although this was not considered statistically significant. Residents responded lowest for “Reflected on how your work helps make the world a better place” (question 1), whereas the lowest faculty responses were for questions 1, 9, and 10. Both had high responses for “Had an enjoyable interaction with a patient” (question 11). Conclusions: Pennsylvania academic anesthesiology faculty survey responses demonstrated a higher level of well-being compared to their residents. The variation in scoring suggests that anesthesiology residents and faculty have differing perceptions of various well-being domains. Information from well-being surveys can help provide programs with focus areas that they can intervene on to improve physician well-being.