By Tom Flanagan, Media Relations Manager
Humayun Chaudhry, DO
Humayun Chaudhry, DO, may not seem like someone who would spend a lot of time on the issue of professional burnout. After all, he’s the president and chief executive officer of the Federation of State Medical Boards (FSMB), whose mission is to support state medical boards in licensing, disciplining, and regulating physicians and other health care professionals in order to keep patients safe.
But Dr. Chaudhry believes that physician burnout is unequivocally a patient safety issue. He’ll bring that message to the Massachusetts Medical Society’s 2019 Annual Education Program on May 3. “As many organizations in the house of medicine started to talk about burnout, the issue landed on our desk and we wondered if we should weigh in on it as well,” said Dr. Chaudhry. “As we started to look into how state boards address the issue, it became very apparent that physician stress and burnout is a patient safety issue. The federation, on behalf of the state boards and working with the state boards, felt that we should look into this.” The FSMB formed a workgroup and came up with a “sensible series of recommendations,” he added.
Of the 35 recommendations, number one was that state medical boards should review their medical licensure and renewal applications and rethink the necessity of including probing questions about an applicant’s past mental health, addiction, or substance use. The thought was that this line of aggressive questioning could discourage physicians from seeking treatment.
Dr. Chaudhry said he is looking forward to the opportunity to engage with the physician and student members of the Medical Society and emphasize that the issue of physician burnout is one that the FSMB and state boards take seriously. “It’s perfectly OK to seek care when you need it,” he said. “Your patients deserve it and you deserve it.”
Dr. Humayun “Hank” Chaudhry is the president and chief executive officer of the Federation of State Medical Boards (FSMB) of the United States, which represents the nation’s state medical licensing boards and co-sponsors the United States Medical Licensing Examination. From 2016 to 2018, Dr. Chaudhry served as chair of the International Association of Medical Regulatory Authorities, which represents more than 116 members in more than 48 nations.
