64: The Colleague Who's Struggling

The number one reason physicians and APPs don't say anything when they're worried about a colleague is that they think they're overreacting.

They tell themselves they're reading too much into it, that everyone's tired, that if it were really bad, somebody else would have noticed, that HR exists for a reason, that their colleague is a grown adult who is also a doctor and presumably knows how to ask for help.

I want to be very direct with you.

If you have noticed enough of a change in a colleague that you are now listening to a podcast episode about it, you are not overreacting.

You are picking up on something real.

We are trained, all of us, to pattern match.

That is literally the job.

You walked into a room today and within 30 seconds you knew which patient was sick and which patient was not sick.

And you can't fully articulate how, but you were right.

That same skill does not turn off when you walk into the break room.

If your gut says something is wrong with your colleague, your gut is using the same machinery it uses to triage.

Trust it.

Now, here's the part that's harder to say.

The reason physicians and APPs are so reluctant to name what we're seeing in each other is that we know, on some level, that if we name it, we'd have to do something about it.

And we are tired.

And our schedules are full.

And we don't want to be the person who started drama.

And we don't want to be wrong.

And honestly, some of us are afraid that if we look too closely at our colleague, we'll have to look at ourselves.

All of that is real.

None of it is a reason to stay quiet.

We have a cultural script in medicine for what a colleague in crisis looks like.

It's loud.

It's dramatic.

It's the person who shows up smelling like alcohol, or who breaks down sobbing in a workroom, or who makes a clearly impaired clinical decision.