Relationship Between Burnout Syndrome and Internet Addiction, and the Risk Factors in Healthcare Employees in a University Hospital

Abstract

Objective: We aimed to evaluate the level of internet use and burnout syndrome among the physicians, nurses, and other employees working at a university hospital, to demonstrate the possible relationships between these two factors, and to define the relationships between both conditions and sociodemographic variables. Methods: The population of this study was selected by simple random sampling method and sample size was calculated considering a confidence interval of and an error rate of 0.05. A self-structured questionnaire, Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), and Internet Addiction Scale (IAS) were completed. Results: While emotional exhaustion and desensitization were significantly higher among surgical medicine physicians, emotional exhaustion levels were significantly lower among the participants who stated that their job selection was intentional. When the correlations between participants' age or their job experience and the scales were assessed, a significant negative correlation was found with internet addiction. There was a significant correlation between burnout sub-dimensions and internet addiction. Conclusion: This study suggests that factors such as method of preferring jobs, workload, and regular sleep, having hobbies, marriage and having children have significant effects on burnout and internet addiction.