Burnout Among Healthcare Professionals and Physicians

Professional burnout of medical professionals is a critical problem of health systems due to its direct impact on the quality of medical care and the psychological well-being of specialists. The purpose of the study was to establish the severity of professional burnout syndrome among Bulgarian medical personnel and identify its associations with organisational working conditions and coping mechanisms. The cross-sectional observational study involved 101 medical workers from various medical institutions in Bulgaria who completed an online survey using the Maslach Burnout Inventory and Pines and Aronson methods in September-December 2025, followed by the use of Pearson correlation analysis and the student’s t-criterion. The results showed a moderate level of emotional exhaustion with an average of 2.83 points, low depersonalisation at 1.81 points, and maintained high professional performance in the range of 3.51-3.78 points on a five-point scale. Overall burnout indices were 2.85 points for the Maslach method and 1.94 points for the Pines and Aronson method, which correspond to moderate and below average levels, respectively. It was determined that 43.9% of respondents work with a high level of personnel shortage, and 74.5% of participants identified staff shortage as the main professional stressor, while only 14.3% considered changing jobs. Correlation analysis showed moderate positive associations of the work environment with burnout indices at 0.519 and 0.567, respectively, while survival strategies showed a protective role due to negative correlations from -0.296 to -0.340. There were no statistically significant differences in burnout rates depending on age, gender, work experience, or type of medical facility. The results obtained justify the need to develop multi-level organisational interventions to optimise personnel policy and strengthen the system of psychological support for medical workers in the Bulgarian healthcare system.