Encouraging Mental Health Care in Family Medicine Residents

Residency training is associated with stress and burnout that can contribute to poor mental health. However, residents are less likely to utilize mental health services due to perceived barriers such as lack of time and concerns about confidentiality, among others.1 There is a need to promote help-seeking behavior and improve access to mental health services during residency training.

In order to decrease barriers to seeking mental health care and promote well-being among residents, the University of California Irvine Family Medicine Residency Program (UCI FMRP) implemented a program that included confidential, regular, mental health check-ins between residents and a psychiatrist. We gathered data on help-seeking behavior from an internally conducted electronic survey of 29 residents regarding perceived barriers to seeking mental health care in June, 2020.

The internal survey results from 24 respondents out of 29 residents demonstrated that the program supported help-seeking behavior among the residents, with 33% of the residents requesting additional sessions with the psychiatrist and another 13% seeking external mental health resources.

Providing additional, confidential, on-site support may be one method of decreasing stigma, increasing access to care, and normalizing conversations around mental health in residency.