Retirement: Fostering Physician Well-being Over the Career Life Cycle

This manuscript is the last chapter in a series of 5 articles considering physician well-being during the course of a career. It focuses on the retirement stage, which follows planning for retirement and deciding when and how to retire. We view retirement as a process, characterized by recalibrating professional and personal activities while maintaining a sense of purpose and meaning in life. Some retirees may continue to work in medicine by seeing patients part-time or mentoring medical students, residents, and junior colleagues. Others may leave their lifelong work and seek joy and meaning in travel, spending time with family and friends, volunteering, and developing their personal interests and activities. Ideally, well-being in retirement includes having sufficient energy for activities and relationships that are meaningful, provide purpose, and are enjoyable. Stress during retirement usually shifts from occupational concerns to personal challenges with professional identity, caring for family and friends, maintaining one's health, and relationship losses. Programs that specifically support retired physicians exist at some large health systems and select academic centers, which can complement resources provided by general medical associations and specialty societies. These can serve as models for other medical centers and a foundation for extending and expanding support to retired physicians.