Not- Hair Loss News – Physician Suicide
Medscape November 17, 2014
The fact is that each year we lose over 400 doctors to suicide—that’s like an entire medical school gone. I lost both men I dated in med school to suicide. In my town, in just over a year, we lost three doctors to suicide. One doc in town lost seven colleagues to suicide! In what other profession can you lose seven colleagues to suicide?!
This is an interesting quote from a female doctor about a problem that is not uncommon. My son, a practicing surgeon, lost a colleague to suicide this year and that was not the first suicide at his hospital. Everyone was shocked. The suicidal doctor clearly did not communicate what must have been depression. Doctors are just like everyone else. They carry their baggage, their disappointments, their problems (both emotional and financial) with what they feel can’t be communicated to others, possibly some defect in themselves. They may not reach out for help, like so many ordinary people. In a conversation with my surgeon son, he said that all too often, the doctors who commit suicide, just don’t reach out and that some system needs to be created to address their somewhat unique status.
Doctors,
I come from a family of physicians. My father was a physician in a small town in Oklahoma-I knew all the doctors and their families.
Some doctors burned out. Some doctors lost their licenses due to drug and alcohol abuse. My dad quietly battled depression, but thankfully, never took his own life.
I grew up with one particular family, whose son also became a doctor. He was the perfect student. Top of his class in HS, College and Medical School. Was married. But took his own life at the age of 27 or 28. It shocked the entire community.
Thank you for sharing this article.