Assessing Where You Are On Your Own Personal “Balance? Scale
By Martha Bernadett, MD, MBA

Balance between family and work, scheduled and unscheduled time, plagues every busy professional today. With the advent of the electronic age, there seems to be no more “down" time. Connection to your practice used to make life easier, but now it seems confining. Why? Because the rules have changed. Patients expect to be able to reach you at all times, and patient loads are heavier than ever. If you don’t plan time for yourself, you won’t have any. Doctors are not known for being the world’s best adapters, and most of us find adaptation painful.

We long for simpler times. Times with less paperwork and fewer required forms and reports. Times when we referred patients to colleagues with a phone call, not a faxed authorization form approved by a third party. Times when we took an afternoon off to relax. The romance of the past can lead to bitterness in our daily lives unless we are able to find balance between our ideal day and the realities we face in today’s practice models...

Read the full article here (.pdf).