Patients want shorter workweeks for docs

The vast majority of Americans believe doctors should have shortened workweeks in order to reduce fatigue and possibly avoid medical mistakes, according to a survey released by Portrait of America.

The survey, released in June and conducted in conjunction with Docrates – a physician-operated website that helps guide medical students and residents, said that fully 85 percent of respondents believe doctors should work no more than 60 hours a week.

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"Residents (training doctors) often work well over 100 hours in a week. As grueling as the schedule can be for doctors, it is seen as a fixture within their medical training. Double and triple workweeks give residents more training in a shorter length of time, which allegedly yields better-trained doctors," said researchers at POA.

"But such work schedules may also result in patient care compromised by chronic exhaustion. Docrates wanted to find out what the public thinks should be the maximum workweek for a doctor," POA said.

By comparison, just 6 percent of Americans believe doctors should work more than 80 hours a week. Eleven percent said they weren't sure.

"Public opinion should not necessarily influence how long a doctor works in a week, but if perception is nine-tenths of reality, patients would apparently not be pleased with care delivered by a doctor they know is working double-time," POA said.

Respondents were asked the question, " To ensure that patient care does not suffer, what is the maximum number of hours per week that a doctor should be allowed to work?"

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In partnership with Portrait of America, Docrates conducted a national telephone survey of 947 randomly selected adults on February 20 and 21, as part of a larger study of Americans' attitudes about health care.

The margin of sampling error was plus or minus 3 percentage points with a 95 percent level of confidence.

In another POA-Docrates survey last month, 46 percent of 1,491 randomly selected adults polled July 15-18 said they believed that doctors have more authority to make medical decisions than do insurance companies. Thirty-six percent said insurance companies have more authority, and 11 percent said they weren't sure.