Fighting Medicos Burnout: Tamil Nadu DME regulates working hours for PG, CRRI Medicos

Chennai: In view of the severe burnout being faced by young doctors working across the state-run medical colleges and aiming to reduce that pressure, the Directorate of Medical Education at Tamil Nadu (DME Tamil Nadu) has regulated the duty hours of the MBBS medicos pursuing post-graduation and Compulsory Rotatory Residential Internship (CRRI).

Working hours of young MBBS doctors have been a matter of concern for a long time across the country and the medicos have been demanding regulations stipulating specific duty timings for them.

The DME Tamil Nadu, finally addressing this issue, has passed orders fixing the working hours of young doctors at Government Medical Colleges (GMCs) in the state.

In its order forwarded to the Deans of all the GMCs, the Director of Medical Education has strictly mentioned that the instructions in earlier office letter regarding the duty timings to PG & CRRI have not been adhered to. Therefore, the Deans of Government Medical Colleges under the control of the directorate have been ordered to follow the following duty timings for PG and CRRI students:

• Regular timings of Post Graduate and CRRI students are 8 AM to 2 PM on all days except admission day. After 2 pm the Post Graduate/CRRIs are an on-call duty as per their duty roaster


• On admission days, in the concerned unit, all postgraduates and CRRIs will work from 7.00 A.M. to 1.00 P.M, after that they should divide into two batches and the First batch will work from 1.00 P.M. to 9.00 P.M and the Second batch will work from 9.00 P.M. to 8.00 A.M. of next day.

Medical Dialogues had been reporting about the plight of young doctors now and then as well as their efforts in asking the government to address it.

A resident doctor is available round the clock at hospitals and medical institutions. At most places, they are at least doing 70 hours of duty in a week, and going upto even 100 and 120 hours a week, in peak and high workload times resulting in them facing rigorous burnout. Long working hours is the major reason along with negative patient-related outcomes, adverse doctor-patient interactions, and interpersonal interactions among the colleagues as the main causes for young doctors experiencing stress, depression, and burnout.

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Noting the Tamil Nadu's order, the Maharashtra Directorate of Medical Education and Research (DMER Maharashtra), which is pressing for the same demand since a few years; stated to My Medical Mantra, "The state government is also trying to regulate the duty hours of the postgraduate students in medical colleges. We have set-up a committee that will take a final decision soon. We are working towards regulating the total working hours of the week."

Last year, Minister of State for Health Ashwini Kumar Choubey informed the Lok Sabha that the working hours for doctors and other medical practitioners employed at three Centre-run hospitals — Ram Manohar Lohia, Safdarjung and Lady Hardinge Medical College — and the associated hospitals in Delhi normally did not exceed 40 hours a week. This has created major uproar within the capital's medical fraternity who countered the minister's statement.

Read Also: We Even Work 100 hours a week: Doctors counter Govt Reply that they work for 40 hrs a week