[Prevalence of burnout syndrome and its associated factors in Primary Care staff]

Burnout syndrome is an emerging disease among health professionals. The aim of this study is to determine the prevalence of occupational burnout among Primary Care staff, as well as to determine the differences in prevalence between family doctors, paediatricians, nurses, administrative-officers, and social-workers, and to evaluate the different related factors.

A cross-sectional, descriptive study was conducted on 178 professionals from 5 different occupational groups in 54 Primary Care centres in Navarre from September to December 2010. An anonymous, self-administered questionnaire that included: the Maslach Burnout Inventory and a questionnaire on socio-demographic and work-related factors.

Burnout was detected in 39.3% of staff. Those with higher levels are administrative-officers and family doctors, with an OR compared to nurses of 4.58 and 5.37, respectively in the dimension of emotional exhaustion, 4.98 and 2.87 in depersonalization, and 8.37 for administrative-officers in personal accomplishment. An association was found between burnout and the following factors: to be a male (for the dimensions of emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, 25.5 and 31.9%, respectively), to be employed in an urban area (for emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, 20 and 27.8%, respectively), use of psychiatric medication (for emotional exhaustion, 30%), size of patient-quota (for depersonalization, with an average of 1,565 patients), and welfare pressure (for emotional exhaustion and depersonalization, averages of 170.35 and 153.54 patients/week, respectively).

About one-third of Primary Care professionals have a high level of burnout, which is mainly associated with the working area, the size of the quota, and professional group, with higher prevalence in administrative-officers and family doctors.