Burnout is related to executive dysfunction in primary healthcare professionals working in rural areas

Healthcare professionals are especially vulnerable to burnout, which implies a hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal dysregulation that could impact the integrity of brain structures needed for cognitive processing. However, a scarce number of studies have analyzed the relationship between burnout and executive functions in this population, and possible modulator factors have not been clarified. This study aims to characterize the burnout level of primary healthcare professionals working in rural areas, and to analyze its relationship with executive functioning, considering the possible modulating role of optimism.

In this cross-sectional study, 32 primary healthcare professionals were recruited from the Carcastillo Health Center (Spain) and underwent an assessment in which burnout was assessed using the Maslach Burnout Inventory - Human Services Survey. Optimism and executive functions were also evaluated.

43.8%, 59.4%, and 56.3% of participants experienced high levels of burnout via emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment. The path analysis showed that emotional exhaustion was associated with poorer Trail Making Test scores (ß = -0.37, SE = 0.17, p = 0.024, Cohen's f2 = 0.15), but optimism was not a significant moderator of this relationship (p = 0.24). The proposed model yielded excellent fit (CFI = 1.00, RMSEA = 0.0001, SRMR = 0.0001, and ?2(3) = 6.07, p = 0.11).

These results suggest that burnout in healthcare professionals could have a detrimental effect on the efficiency of health systems. This has relevant implications, especially for professionals characterized by both work pressure and high cognitive demands, and highlights a need to implement occupation-specific approaches for prevention.