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Observational Study
. 2021 Jul 6;23(7):e26817.
doi: 10.2196/26817.

Frustration With Technology and its Relation to Emotional Exhaustion Among Health Care Workers: Cross-sectional Observational Study

Daniel S Tawfik  1 , Amrita Sinha  1 , Mohsen Bayati  2   3 , Kathryn C Adair  4 , Tait D Shanafelt  5   6 , J Bryan Sexton  4   7 , Jochen Profit  1   8
Affiliations
Observational Study

Frustration With Technology and its Relation to Emotional Exhaustion Among Health Care Workers: Cross-sectional Observational Study

Daniel S Tawfik et al. J Med Internet Res. .

Abstract

Background: New technology adoption is common in health care, but it may elicit frustration if end users are not sufficiently considered in their design or trained in their use. These frustrations may contribute to burnout.

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate and quantify health care workers' frustration with technology and its relationship with emotional exhaustion, after controlling for measures of work-life integration that may indicate excessive job demands.

Methods: This was a cross-sectional, observational study of health care workers across 31 Michigan hospitals. We used the Safety, Communication, Operational Reliability, and Engagement (SCORE) survey to measure work-life integration and emotional exhaustion among the survey respondents. We used mixed-effects hierarchical linear regression to evaluate the relationship among frustration with technology, other components of work-life integration, and emotional exhaustion, with adjustment for unit and health care worker characteristics.

Results: Of 15,505 respondents, 5065 (32.7%) reported that they experienced frustration with technology on at least 3-5 days per week. Frustration with technology was associated with higher scores for the composite Emotional Exhaustion scale (r=0.35, P<.001) and each individual item on the Emotional Exhaustion scale (r=0.29-0.36, P<.001 for all). Each 10-point increase in the frustration with technology score was associated with a 1.2-point increase (95% CI 1.1-1.4) in emotional exhaustion (both measured on 100-point scales), after adjustment for other work-life integration items and unit and health care worker characteristics.

Conclusions: This study found that frustration with technology and several other markers of work-life integration are independently associated with emotional exhaustion among health care workers. Frustration with technology is common but not ubiquitous among health care workers, and it is one of several work-life integration factors associated with emotional exhaustion. Minimizing frustration with health care technology may be an effective approach in reducing burnout among health care workers.

Keywords: biomedical technology; electronic health records; emotional exhaustion; frustration with technology; health information systems; medical informatics applications; professional burnout; user-centered design; work-life balance; work-life integration.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of Interest: TDS is co-inventor of the Well-Being Index instruments and the Participatory Management Leadership Index. Mayo Clinic holds the copyright to these instruments and has licensed them for use outside Mayo Clinic. Mayo Clinic pays TDS a share of royalties received. As an expert in clinician well-being, TDS frequently presents grand round and keynote presentations and advises medical centers on clinician well-being. He receives honorarium for some of these engagements.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Frustration with technology scores by job position. Data shown as mean values and 95% confidence limits of the mean, with the reference line at a population mean of 35.03.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Emotional exhaustion scores, stratified by quartile of the technology frustration scores for each work setting, shown for all respondents (A) and stratified by direct patient care versus indirect patient care (B). Data are shown as mean values and upper 95% confidence limits, with results of t tests of adjacent quartiles.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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