Burnout Syndrome in Moroccan Training Resident: Impact on Quality of Life.

Medical residency is an enriching experience; it is a required process to prepare for a solid career and personal growth of the young medical staff. In a developing country, where material and human resources are limited, the resident is compelled to overinvest in order to achieve satisfaction. In view to manage the feeling of helplessness in this complex system, psychosocial coping is required. Burnout syndrome has been described as an inability to cope with emotional stress at work (1). In this study, we aimed to evaluate the prevalence of burnout syndrome (BOS), and to investigate , whether; the sociodemographics, professional factors, and burnout syndrome; affected the quality of life (QOL) of training residents. This was an observational cross-sectional survey including 198 Residents, conducted from April to October 2010 in Ibn Sina Teaching Hospital, Morocco. Anonymous self-administered questionnaires were distributed manually to residents of several specialties. The study protocol and consent procedure was approved by the Rabat Medical School Ethics Committee. The questionnaire contained two sections: The first contains socio-demographics and professional characteristics including the following items: age (per year), gender, and marital status (single or married). Professional characteristics included distance from residence to work (per kilometers); specialty (Medical, Chirurgical, Medico-chirurgical, Radiology-biology-pathological anatomy, radio-therapy-oncology, and Emergency-intensive care), month in health care practice, working hours per week, and number of shifts per month. The second section contains the Arabic, and validated versions of Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) (2), and quality of life measures (EuroQoL questionnaire (EQ-5D)) (3-5). MBI is a 22-item measure containing three sub-scales: a) The emotional exhaustion (EE) (9 items) b) the depersonalization (DP) (5 items), c) the personal accomplishment (PA) (8items). More burnout is indicated by higher scores on EE and DP, and lower scores on PA. The first part of the EQ-5D contains a description of the health state in 5 dimensions or items: Mobility, Self-care, Usual activities,