Physician Leadership: A Delicate Balance

Medicine is a helping profession, the primary purpose of which is to serve the needs of patients. Physicians advise, and, if possible, cure and assist those who look to them for help. They expertly make diagnoses and decide which tests to order, therapies to employ, medications to prescribe and procedures to perform. Further, they develop rapport with patients, and educate and advance the field through research. However, physician leaders, in addition to their responsibilities as physicians, delicately balance their clinical duties and leadership skills to shape strategy and implement change within health care organizations.

In this issue, we get a true understanding of how experienced physician leaders delicately balance their roles as organizational leaders and practicing physicians. Two peer-reviewed articles illustrate the diverse roles of physician leaders. One presents the necessity for physicians, physician leaders and physician organizations to recognize the evolution of antitrust laws in health care and to advocate comprehensive antitrust policies specific to the industry. The other describes an approach to chronic disease management by empathically understanding the difficulties — and limited health literacy — patients face. Though health care is complex, it provides opportunities for physician leaders to improve it not only at the level of the patient, but at scale.

We also include a peer-reviewed piece on a critically important topic for the success of overwhelmed physician leaders: the social and psychological framework for understanding burnout, an important element to the development of delicately balanced physician leaders. We know burnout is a serious and complex issue that won’t be solved overnight. However, by understanding burnout and incorporating strategies, physician leaders can help their organizations move to deliberate, meaningful and sustained action to address this critical issue.

As you read through this collection of articles, which we have carefully selected for this issue, I encourage you to consider their relevance in your work with your teams every day. Not just for the purposes of informing your own leadership strategies, but also in terms of the ways you can help to inform your colleagues, staff and others.

We welcome your papers for publication. To request author guidelines or to submit a completed manuscript, email editor@physicianleaders.org.