
Are Doctors Super Human?

It’s common knowledge that an example is more powerful than words. After all, aren’t parents routinely admonished for telling their children to do one thing while clearly breaking that same rule themselves? For parents and non-parents alike, saying one thing while doing something else greatly diminishes the influence of the words. Maybe that explains why most people don’t get enough zzzzzzz’s. Let me explain.
The number of people who suffer from sleep-deprivation are substantial. Data from the National Sleep Foundation’s 2007 Sleep Study shows that 67% of women experience sleep problems more than once a week. And beyond the statistics, it is obvious that sleep-issues plague many. Just take a look at the covers of magazines or check out your local paper; you don’t have to look far to find a story about how to sleep better.
Ironically, medical professionals routinely assert that getting a proper night’s rest is vital, is necessary, to being healthy and feeling good. Adequate, quality sleep is touted to help a number of medical problems from clinical depression to the common cold. And anyone who has worked or works with children knows first-hand how important a good-night’s sleep is for promoting a balanced mood and emotional resilience. Point is, sleep is one of the most important things we can do to keep our bodies and minds healthy. At least that’s what the medical professionals tell us.
This is precisely why it has always amazed me that this same profession has routinely ignored their own advice. The recent BMJ article, Efforts to reduce US trainees’ hours were ineffective, study says, is recent evidence that interns and doctors are still expected to work ridiculously long hours in hospitals.
The consequences of tired doctors on-call are obvious and so to remedy this problem the US Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education enforced new limits of no more than 30 consecutive hours for residents whose long shifts were more likely to cause mistakes or patient risks. Interns participating in this particular study kept journals noting the basics such as hours spent working or sleeping. They also noted things such as car crashes or possible risky medical situations such as errors they made.
Unfortunately, the study was unable to prove that a more rational system that allowed interns to get the rest they needed prevented most of the mistakes that lack-of-sleep were previously blamed for! The reason? Interns, regardless of the new limits, were still required to work ridiculously long-hours so the results could not be measured.
Now I know that it takes a lot to make it through medical school and through the rotations that are mandatory before becoming a certified MD. But come on, doctors are not superhuman. They are not immune to the effects, sometimes deadly effects, of sleep-deprivation. The human body requires sleep, as the medical profession is so fond of telling us. Why is it then that those whose business is the human body aren’t allowed to take care of their own?
Reference
J. H. Tanne (2008). Efforts to reduce US trainees’ hours were ineffective, study says BMJ, 337 (aug05 2) DOI: 10.1136/bmj.a1140
12 Responses
[...] worst health. If you are young and intending to be a doctor, check out the post by Brain Blogger, Are Doctors Super Human? posted at Brain Blogger, saying, “The consequences of tired doctors on-call are obvious and [...]
[...] Blogger presents Are Doctors Super Human? posted at Brain Blogger, saying, “The consequences of tired doctors on-call are obvious and [...]
Total Mind and Body Fitness Blog Carnival 70…
Monday is Blog Carnivals Day. A Blog Carnival is basically a collection of articles or blog posts, all relating to a similar subject, that are gathered together for your viewing pleasure. You can quickly and conveniently see a list of Article Titles a…
[...] Are Doctors Super Human? | Brain Blogger [...]
Leave a Reply
Popular Posts
- Mind Games - Science's Attempts at Thought Control
- The Science of Stuttering
- Risks of Personalized Medicine
- Intelligence - Are You Holding Back Your Brain?
- Is Grief a Mental Illness?
- The Brain's Buying Power
- The Cost of a Good Night's Sleep
- Risk Factors for Recurrence of Depression
- Salvia Divinorum - DEA Control over Magic in the Mint
- The Many Emerging Roles of Astrocytes
Future Posts
Latest Posts
- Thinking Fast Equals Risky Business
- A Gateway to Weight Loss?
- Intelligence – Do You Need it to be Successful?
- A Trip for Terminal Patients
- Memory Ain’t What It Used to Be – And That’s Good for Psychotherapy
- The Science of Stuttering
- Are Your Friends Making You Fat?
- Beer – The Smarter Drink
- Macroeconomics and Suicide
- From Nymphomania to Hypersexuality
Comments
- Ryan: Great post! I agree with the p
- : I have used heroin for 20 year
- Lino Baine: I am not aware that people wit
- Lulu Jones: Hmm....this is interesting. I
- Robert A. Yourell, MA: Hi Stephanie...OR they tried a
- Stephnie: Based on the facts in the arti
- Sammy: I was a test subject for one o
- Veronica Pamoukaghlian, MA: Thank you for your insightful
- Richard Kensinger, MSW: I agree w/ Howard Gardner's pe
- Melbzi: Muso's and smoked pot.I q
- Melbzi: I am 36 and from Melbourne Aus
- CODER: When we get sick, really sick









Who is helping doctors cope with the uncertainties of life?” Hmmmmmmmmmmm?
Doctors have no capacity left nowadays. With all the stress and chaos that is on their plate, doctors simply
do not have the capacity to give a CRA! about patients as their own personal life issues leave them to UN Sympathetic and basically cold as hel! about patient concerns.
Doctors are working in a broken health care system. They’re not exactly having a good time–surveys suggest that they’re frustrated, overworked, exhausted.
Still, they do set a stunningly bad example for the rest of us, when it comes to sleep. And when they’re sleepdeprived, they make more errors, as Charles Czeisler’s work shows… Scary.
Gayle Greene, author of INSOMNIAC, sleepstarved.org
doctors are still normal people you know…
Great articles!
Doctors are now busy with schedules. They are running with clock. At same time technology and communication also improved. if we have enough money we can get perfect diagnosis.
It scares me to think that I could be seen by a doctor who is at the end of a long long shift or in need of a good nights sleep (or both). At the end of the day we patients put our lives in their hands, literally. We need reassurance and doctors need help.
That’s what they say: “Follow what I say do not follow what I do”.
It is very mysterious to say that doctors are super human but still i want to say there is something which make doctors to shine brighter in croud it is nothing but his skil n knowldgw to save life but this can not support the statement .It is upon us that what we see in the doctor a simple human or super human .
great read, what is more interesting is the fact that Japanese scientists claim that doctors will no longer be hands-on/exist in the future as robots will be programmed to do all the work.