When Your Practice Loses Physicians, Your Workday Needs a New Plan

Your practice just lost 25% of its physicians. Maybe even 50%. Has anything changed about how you are expected to get the work done? Are you still expected to see the same number of patients, manage the same responsibilities, complete the same administrative work, and somehow finish everything within the same workday? If so, something needs to change. 

When physician capacity changes, everything changes. Physician shortages can happen unexpectedly - a physician leaves or retires, recruitment takes longer than anticipated, a new physician’s start date gets delayed, an unexpected leave creates additional responsibilities for the remaining team. The remaining physicians may suddenly find themselves seeing more patients, handling additional responsibilities, and carrying a greater share of the workload. Yet the expectations remain unchanged. Physicians often respond by working harder, staying later, arriving earlier, and catching up on charts, inbox messages, phone calls, and other administrative tasks at night and on weekends. You cannot expect the same workflow to produce the same results when the circumstances have fundamentally changed.

Before you change your workflow, acknowledge your new reality. One of the most important preparations is recognizing and accepting what has changed. Your practice has fewer physicians. The workload and available capacity have changed. Your previous workflow may no longer be appropriate. What worked when your practice was fully staffed may not work today. 

Accepting reality does not mean agreeing that the situation is acceptable.

It does not mean giving up, lowering your standards, or accepting that you must work late indefinitely. It means stopping the internal struggle over how things should be and redirecting your energy toward what you can do now. Instead of repeatedly thinking, “This shouldn’t be happening,” begin asking, “Given the situation today, what can I do differently?”

Stop trying to squeeze more work into your old workflow. Rather than simply trying to work faster or squeeze additional responsibilities into an already full schedule, step back and assess how your work gets done. I encourage you to ask yourselves:

• What absolutely requires my attention as a physician?
• What can be handled differently?
• What responsibilities can be redistributed among team members?
• What can wait?
• What expectations need to be revisited?
• Where am I spending time that could be used more effectively?

Explore the importance of being intentional about:

• Prioritizing responsibilities rather than treating everything as equally urgent.
• Identifying opportunities to delegate and redistribute appropriate tasks.
• Rethinking how patient care, charting, inbox management, and administrative work are organized. 
• Recognizing habits and workflows that may no longer serve the current situation.

Working harder within an outdated system is not necessarily the answer. Sometimes the answer is to change the way you work.

You are more capable of navigating this situation than you think. Physician shortages can feel overwhelming, frustrating, and even discouraging. Physicians may feel that there is no way to keep up unless they sacrifice their personal time. 

I invite you to explore from a different perspective:

• You do not need to figure everything out in one day.
• You do not need to solve every problem yourself.
• You can start with small, intentional changes.
• You can ask for help, explore resources, and involve your team.
• You can create a different way of approaching your workday. 

Providing excellent patient care and leaving work on time are not mutually exclusive, even when you are short-staffed. You do not necessarily have to see fewer patients, compromise the care you provide, or accept working evenings and weekends as your new normal. You may need a different approach.

Your next workday can start with a different plan. You may not control how many physicians work in your practice, when recruitment will be successful, or how quickly staffing challenges will resolve. You can prepare yourself to respond differently. Rather than allowing the staffing shortage to dictate every part of your workday, acknowledge your current reality. Identify what needs to change. Re-evaluate your priority and workflow. Take one manageable step toward a more sustainable workday. If the capacity of your practice has changed, what needs to change about the way your workday is organized? Your practice may have fewer physicians today, but that does not mean your evenings and weekends must become an extension of your clinic hours. You deserve a workday that allows you to provide the care your patients need while also having time and energy for your own life. You do not have to accept that working late is simply part of being a physician.

If you are a physician who feels overwhelmed, constantly behind on charts and inbox messages, and finds yourself spending hours finishing work after your last patient, you are not alone. I understand how exhausting it can feel to give so much to your patients and still have an entire evening of work waiting for you. Through my 1:1 Physician Coaching Program, I help physicians rethink how they approach their workday, develop more effective ways of managing their responsibilities, and create a sustainable workflow that allows them to leave work on time. You do not have to choose between taking excellent care of your patients and having a life outside of medicine. There is another way to practice medicine. You do not have to figure it out alone.