[Life satisfaction, health status, and professional satisfaction of urologists in private practice]

The medical profession still enjoys a high standing in the general population. It does, however, have considerable drawbacks. These include high levels of time expenditure and intense psychological stress, lower degree of life satisfaction, limited leisure time and private life, and immense physical stress in connection with increased health risk behavior. Between January 2004 and March 2006, a survey was conducted among urologists in private practice in the German states of Hesse, Lower Saxony, Saxony, and Thuringia concerning their life satisfaction, health status, and professional satisfaction. Of the 599 physicians contacted by mail, 194 returned the completed 14-page questionnaire. The rate of return was 30.8%. The questionnaire contained items on professional situation, wishes and plans, health, personal data, life situation, and attitude towards various aspects of life. The following questionnaires were employed: questions on professional self-efficacy according to Abele et al. (2000), on professional stress and life satisfaction according to Fahrenberg et al. (2000), and on professional gratification according to de Jonge et al. (2000). Physical complaints were assessed by the short form of the Giessen Complaint Questionnaire. When possible, the data were compared with those of a representative population sample. Analysis revealed that registered urologists considered bureaucratic administrative chores to cause the greatest strain, followed by an uncertain future and lack of a private life. Although >74.8% believed that their physical condition was good or very good, urologists suffer more frequently from cardiac and abdominal complaints than the average population and are exhausted to a considerably higher extent. With their above average willingness to overtax themselves, the imbalance between exhaustion and benefit is far greater than in the population sample. This could represent the cause of the psychosomatic complaints among the physicians.