Medics need to open up

A SOUTH African psychiatrist believes that medics’ discretion about their mental health challenges could be contributing to the stigma around them, resulting in most health workers who have psychiatric issues suffering in silence.

Writing in the July edition of SAMA Insider – a monthly non-clinical magazine of the SA Medical Association – Dr Christoffel Grobler, spoke about his own battle with mental illness in an article entitled ‘Doctors with depression: don’t wait until it’s too late!’

“In recent years, I have personally made a point of sharing my own mental illnesses, namely generalised anxiety disorder and social anxiety disorder, when giving talks… something which elicits very different reactions from colleagues versus the general public, ranging from visible cringing to appreciation for my honesty,” he wrote.

Speaking to Independent Media about this article, Grobler said: “Doctors are especially secretive about mental illness. I think we, as doctors, are part of the problem in that I think we contribute to the stigma around mental health, because we ourselves don’t disclose our struggle with it. And our patients will do the same.”

He said statistics indicate that 40% of the general population will at some stage of their life suffer from mental illness. “People think of mental illness as only being illnesses like bipolar or schizophrenia. But an anxiety disorder, ADHD, social anxiety disorder, are all mental illnesses.”

Grobler said it is estimated that between 10 and 20% of doctors become depressed at some point in their career, and that 10% to 12% develop a substance abuse disorder.

Female doctors are possibly at higher risk than the general population for developing depression and burnout as a result of role conflicts at home and work, such as work pressures and parenting and/or marital demands.

Young doctors such as medical students and registrars are more prone to mental illness, with rates of depression in this population ranging between 15% and 30%.