Background: Burnout is associated with decreased job performance and low career satisfaction. It has a special significance in health care, where staff experience both psychological-emotional and physical stress.
Aim: To investigate levels of job satisfaction and burnout among Istanbul physicians, and the relationships between demographic characteristics, job characteristics, job satisfaction and burnout.
Design: Questionnaire-based survey.
Methods: We collected data from a randomly selected sample group of 598 physicians from different health-care institutions in Istanbul. A questionnaire regarding sociodemographic characteristics of the physicians, the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) and the Minnesota Job Satisfaction Questionnaire (MSQ) were all administered during face-to-face interviews.
Results: Job satisfaction was inversely correlated with emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, and positively correlated with personal accomplishment. Under multilevel regression, the most significant and common predictors of all burnout dimensions and job satisfaction were the number of vacations at individual level, and public ownership of healthcare facilities at group level. Number of shifts per month was also a significant predictor of all burnout dimensions.
Discussion: Organizational efforts aimed at increasing the level of job satisfaction among physicians could help to prevent burnout.