Smartwatch Use and Physician Well-Being: A Randomized Clinical Trial

Area of Science:

• Medical Informatics
• Occupational Health
• Clinical Trials

Background:

• Physician burnout is a significant issue impacting patient care quality and safety.
• Few randomized studies have investigated interventions to mitigate physician burnout.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess if wearing a smartwatch and utilizing its physiological data improves physician well-being.
• To identify specific dimensions of well-being affected by smartwatch use.

Main Methods:

• A randomized clinical trial involving 184 physicians at two US medical centers.
• Participants wore a smartwatch for six months, with data collected on burnout, resilience, quality of life, depressive symptoms, stress, and sleepiness.
• Intention-to-treat analysis was performed on survey data collected at baseline and 3, 6, 9, and 12 months.

Main Results:

• After six months, physicians wearing a smartwatch showed a trend towards lower burnout rates (41.2% vs 50.5%).
• Significantly higher resilience scores were observed in the smartwatch intervention group (mean 31.9 vs 29.5, P=.01).
• Multivariable analysis indicated lower burnout prevalence (OR=0.46) and higher resilience (1.20 points) in the intervention arm.

Conclusions:

• Wearing a smartwatch and accessing physiological data was associated with improvements in physician burnout and resilience.
• Further research is recommended to explore how engagement with smartwatch data can drive behavioral changes to reduce burnout and enhance resilience.