Minimizing Medical Burnout: Mila Verkhoglaz and Yelena Sokolsky Of Galaxy Home Care On How Hospitals and Medical Practices Are Helping To Reduce Physician and Healthcare Worker Burnout
An Interview With Dan Rodrigues
To reduce burnout, we ask questions that are relevant and timely. We prevent employee burnouts by asking our employees what they value and need. Gaining insights from our employees through questions provides valuable information as to what makes employees feel motivated, and what doesn’t. Question around overall job satisfaction, work-life balance and flexibility, employee recognition, compensation, and effective communication with the manager.
The pandemic was hard on all of us. But statistics have shown that the pressures of the pandemic may have hit physicians and healthcare workers the hardest. While employment is starting to return to pre-pandemic levels generally, the healthcare sector is lagging behind with a significant percentage of healthcare workers not returning to work. This is one of the factors that is causing a shortage of doctors. Some experts say that the US may soon be short almost 124,000 physicians. (See here for example) What are hospitals and medical practices doing to help ease the extreme mental strain of doctors and healthcare workers? What are hospitals and medical practices doing to help solve the scourge of physician and healthcare worker burnout?
To address these questions, we are talking to hospital administrators, medical clinic executives, medical school experts, and experienced physicians who can share stories and insights from their experience about “How Hospitals and Medical Practices Are Helping To Reduce Physician and Healthcare Worker Burnout”. As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Brynna Connor, MD, Healthcare Ambassador at NorthWestPharmacy.com.
The leaders of Brooklyn-based Galaxy Home Care are hoping their extensive experience in home-based care — including on the front lines — will allow them to thrive while at the helm.
They’re also hoping more old-school approaches — like word-of-mouth advertising and hiring offices — will guide their growth in the new world of home-based care.
Galaxy’s CEO Yelena Sokolsky — a registered nurse with over 18 years of experience in home care — first realized the importance of home care when she had to take care of her parents and grandparents. As a family of immigrants, it started with bridging the language barrier.
From graduating with both a psychology and nursing degree, Sokolsky eventually made her way into the home care space. In July 2021, after holding several jobs both on the administrative side and on the patient-service side, Sokolsky teamed up with co-founder Mila Verkhoglaz to start Galaxy Home Care.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! I know that you are a very busy person. Before we dive into the main focus of our interview, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. The two fundamental questions to ask is: “What is a Burnout“ and “What is Causing Burnout in Home Healthcare Workers?”.
A basic answer is a physical and emotional exhaustion caused by continual periods of stress. While most of the white-collar workers were working comfortably from their homes during the heights of the COVID -19 pandemic, our front-line workers/caregivers continued to make visits to our clients. You can only imagine the fear and insecurity they experienced — “will I catch COVID from the client, or the subway or bus while travelling to see clients and will I spread COVID to patients, love-ones and co-workers?”. At the time, lack of personal protective equipment and unreliable guidance from the CDC, state and local governments continued to increase the level of stress. Even before the pandemic health employees experienced high burnout rates. Now with the pandemic, burnout rates have been accelerated. COVID has caused a shortage of Home Healthcare workers because many of them stayed away, and many in the field feel exhausted. What the Home Healthcare workers have gone through during this pandemic has been traumatic.
What causes burnouts in Home Healthcare workers?
Caregiving jobs can be rewarding but can also cause burnout because the job is frequently very demanding. In general, some of the top reasons that cause burnouts are unfair treatment, unclear roles, little to no communication from the manager, and unreasonable time frames. Stress is often one component that leads to burnout. Additionally, burnout experienced by the employees impacts the worker’s performance and the quality of care provided to the patients. Employees with burnout increase the likelihood of making mistakes. An error in treatment or the medication for the patient can be life-threatening.
How Galaxy Home Care helps to reduce and eliminate burnout
To reduce burnout, we ask questions that are relevant and timely. We prevent employee burnouts by asking our employees what they value and need. Gaining insights from our employees through questions provides valuable information as to what makes employees feel motivated, and what doesn’t. Question around overall job satisfaction, work-life balance and flexibility, employee recognition, compensation, and effective communication with the manager.
Our field employees are the ones who are the face of the company, and whether or not it runs smoothly depends on them.
Ok, thank you for all of that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview about minimizing medical burnout. Let’s begin with a basic definition of terms so that all of us are on the same page. How do you define “Physician and Healthcare Worker Burnout”? Does it just mean poor job satisfaction? Can you explain?
A basic answer burnout is a physical and emotional exhaustion caused by continual periods of stress. While most of the white-collar workers were working comfortably from their homes during the heights of the COVID -19 pandemic, our front-line workers/caregivers continued to make visits to our clients. Caregivers love what they do but it’s the working conditions and unrealistic expectations that cause poor job satisfaction.
How would you define or describe the opposite of burnout?
I am no expert in the field, but a practitioner in the world of home healthcare. However, in a word, the opposite of burnout is engagement. To be engaged is to be completely present in your work. In fact, work is no longer viewed as work when one is fully engaged.
From your experience, perspective, or research, what are the main causes of Physician and Healthcare Worker Burnout?
Caregiving jobs can be rewarding but can also cause burnout because the job is frequently very demanding. In general, some of the top reasons that cause burnouts are unfair treatment, unclear roles, little to no communication from the manager, and unreasonable time frames. Stress is often one component that leads to burnout.
Have you seen burnout impact your own organization? Can you give a first hand description of how burnout can impact the operations of an organization?
Burnout experienced by the employees impacts the worker’s performance and the quality of care provided to the patients. Employees with burnout increase the likelihood of making mistakes. An error in treatment or the medication for the patient can be life-threatening.
Does your practice currently offer any mental health resources for providers or clinical staff? We’d love to hear about it.
We do not offer any mental health resources at this time.
In my work I have found that streamlining operational efficiency with digital transformation and automated processes helps to ease the workload of providers and clinical staff. Has that been your experience as well? Do you think that streamlining operational efficiency can be one of the tools to minimize medical burnout? We’d love to hear your perspective.
Galaxy Home Care utilizes the latest software tools available to us to efficiently and effectively operate our home healthcare company.But as everyone knows software and processes are only as good as they are used by the management and administrative staff. As you mentioned, operational efficiency is one of our top goals. However, we are in people business, and we provide services that are very personal in nature. We deal with people — patients, caregivers, family members, state officials, insurance personnel, medical personnel, and many other players — there are a lot of moving parts and not all of them always work in synchrony.
Fantastic. Here is the main question of our discussion. Can you share 5 things that hospitals and medical practices can do to reduce physician and healthcare worker burnout?
To reduce burnout, we ask questions that are relevant and timely. We prevent employee burnouts by asking our employees what they value and need. Gaining insights from our employees through questions provides valuable information as to what makes employees feel motivated, and what doesn’t. Question around overall job satisfaction, work-life balance and flexibility, employee recognition, compensation, and effective communication with the manager.
What can concerned friends, colleagues, and life partners do to help someone they care about reverse burnout?
When we coach caregivers who feel burned out, we follow these simple themes: 1. We uncover their strengths, 2. We uncover their weaknesses, 3. We encourage development of strong partners at work, 4. We encourage communication with management, 5. We identify a go-to manager who will listen, 6. We encourage good health habits, 7. If all the above fail, we work with the caregivers on a career change. Anyone who is concerned about the burnout can follow these guidelines.
What are a few of the most common mistakes you have seen people make when they try to reverse burnout in themselves or others? What can they do to avoid those mistakes?
Some people attempt to reverse burnout by themselves without any help. I think that it’s difficult to do it on your own. Communication with peers and management, providing feedback, and sharing the struggles to management without hesitation is important to get to the root cause that cause stress and burnout.
This was truly meaningful! Thank you so much for your time and for sharing your expertise!
About The Interviewer: Dan Rodrigues is the founder and CEO of Kareo, a Tebra company, a leading provider of cloud-based clinical and practice management software solutions for independent healthcare practices and billing companies. Rodrigues is known for his visionary leadership in the healthcare technology industry. Rodrigues’ future-forward expertise has led companies such as Scour and Skematix. He is highly committed to providing patients with a seamless, digital experience in healthcare. Rodrigues’ business insights have been featured in publications including Forbes, Fierce Healthcare, and AP News.
Minimizing Medical Burnout: Mila Verkhoglaz and Yelena Sokolsky Of Galaxy Home Care On How… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.