Fix This Before You Try To Be More Efficient: Why You Are Still Working After Your Last Patient

Dr. M shared with me the other day that she works seven days on and seven days off. During her work week, she often feels tense and easily irritated. She brings her work and works many hours after seeing her last patient. She finds herself snapping at her children. She thinks that it is also spilling into patient care. During her off week, she is almost like a different person – calm, patient and present. She is more connected with her children and not short with them. Same person, same physician, same training and same capabilities. Nothing about her skillset changed – so why did everything else differ?

What is actually driving the difference in her experience? Many of us will answer almost instantly that it is because of her workload and the amount of time she spends working. It is more than just the workload. It is more than time constraints. There is something deeper shaping how her days unfold.

The common solution many physicians are taught to do is to improve efficiency, learn better workflows and use EMR shortcuts. These are helpful, but they do not explain why the same physician performs so differently from week to week.

Before focusing on techniques to improve the work, the more important focus is the real driver behind your work – your emotional fuel. The emotion you operate from determines how you work. When Dr. M is feeling tense and stressed, she is working in the space of reactivity. During her off week, Dr. M is feeling calm and is at ease. She creates better presence and less friction. Human beings experience a whole spectrum of emotions – if you allow them. Your emotional state is either draining you or supporting you.

What drives your emotions? Your thoughts about your day create your feelings. Your feelings drive your actions and results. For example, you are forty minutes behind on your schedule. If you are thinking, “I’m so behind”, you are likely feeling anxious. Your focus is scattered and it is hard for you to concentrate. You are not working efficiently and the result is that you are staying late or bringing the leftover work home. On the other hand, if you are thinking, “Alright, I can handle this, one step at a time,” you are likely feeling calmer. You are more focused, making steady progress and you end up finishing on time or just a little after seeing your last patient.

Staying late or bringing work home is not just about the volume. It is about how you are showing up mentally and emotionally. When you are operating in a state of stress, overwhelm or anxiety, the hidden cost is reduced efficiency, emotional spillover into home life (which affects your family), and increased strain in relationships with your patients, staff and family.

For a long time, I believed that when I experienced a certain feeling, that was it. It was from the circumstances I was in. What I did not realize is that our emotions are generated by what we think about our situation. Our circumstances, which are neutral, do not affect us unless we have an opinion about it. Most of the time we cannot change our circumstances, but we have the power to intentionally choose our thoughts about those circumstances. In other words, if we think of the same situation differently, we generate a different emotion. We have the power to choose a thought that creates more helpful emotions. I am not encouraging forced positivity. What I am saying is believable and grounding thoughts. Back to the example of you being forty minutes behind schedule. Instead of focusing on “I’m so behind”, you can choose to think “I am capable” or “progress is enough right now”. The latter two thoughts generate very different emotions from the first thought. Calm and clarity outperform stress and urgency every time.

Your emotional state affects more than just you. It is felt by everyone around you. Patients sense if you are calm or tense. Your team responds differently if you, the leader, is angry or grateful. Your family experiences a different version of you when you experience different emotions. The unspoken language can work for or against you. You can learn to choose your thoughts rather than settle with the default ones. Choose the helpful emotional fuel to finish your day.

When you can always utilize the emotional state that supports better focus and clarity, the tools you learned – workflow improvements, automation and teamwork – are far more effective. Imagine that you are consistently leaving work on time. You are feeling lighter at the end of the day. You are enjoying both medicine and your life again. This starts with acknowledging and managing your thoughts and choosing a sustainable emotion to fuel your day.

If this resonates with you, I invite you to join our newsletter for deeper insights, and to explore our 1:1 Physician Coaching Program. If you recognize yourself in this story, there is a way to change it – and you do not have to figure it out alone.