From Striving To Thriving with Dr. Diane Shannon
In this episode, I sat down and talked with Dr. Diane Shannon, who made the hard decision to leave practice and pursue a career in medical writing, after experiencing paralyzing burnout as a newly minted primary care physician. For 20 years, Dr. Shannon worked with non-profit foundations that seek to improve the health care system, focusing attention on clinician burnout, lack of reliability, and patient safety issues.
Her personal experience with burnout and her desire to support the physicians that sought her out for help, motivated her to become a certified coach three years ago. She now helps physicians escape the riptide of work and home pressures to get clear about what they really want, overcome barriers, and make changes to vastly improve their professional and personal lives. Since the pandemic, Dr. Shannon has focused special attention on helping women physicians address burnout, overwhelm, and self-doubt. She continues to advocate for health system change through her writing and speaking engagements. She is co-author of Preventing Physician Burnout: Curing the Chaos and Returning Joy to the Practice of Medicine, which was published in 2016.
We know as women physicians the challenges we face and the continued stressors that can lead to depression, anxiety, PTSD, burnout, and ultimately the decision that some of us make to leave the medical field part-time or entirely.
In this interview, I discuss with Dr. Shannon, how women physicians can go from Striving to Thriving
Here’s what we covered:
- Thinking about your career and leadership journey who or what may have been instrumental in that decision?
- What does a day as an advocate and burnout champion look like? Who do you serve? What problem do you solve?
- Define burnout and how it shows up in women physicians?
- Define for us what self-care means to you and what self-care looks like when it comes to women in leadership in healthcare?
- What would it take for organizations to help combat burnout and support and retain women physicians?
Follow Dr. Shannon at
www.Linkedin.com/in/dianewshannon
Are you taking time for yourself? How much or little are you prioritizing self-care. To answer this question, I invite you to take the self-care quiz www.justtherightbalance.com/selfcarequiz
