As a doctor you’ve studied, trained, and practiced for years, probably decades, to provide the best care for your patients. But as our world has become increasingly tech-driven and connected, the pressures from both within and outside of the healthcare workspace for your time and attention have multiplied.

Whether it’s pings from the EHR, text messages from the hospital, urgent calls from colleagues or families, or the never-ending torrent of emails, your attention has become more fragmented than ever before.

When you’re busy and feeling time-pressured, mindfulness may seem to be an uneasy, even unwelcome, construct.  Who has time for it? Yet it turns out that simple mindfulness practices can help you to reframe and de-escalate the struggles of the day.

Mindfulness won’t cure the ills that physicians face in the current healthcare environment, but it can mitigate their impact. In this article I will show you how using mindfulness can create the mental space you need to confidently and calmly manage patient care while protecting your precious time.

Start with Mindful Mornings

Mornings can often feel a little frantic, but finding room for a simple 5-minute mindfulness practice can help to set the tone for your day. Here are some ideas to get you started:

• Sit quietly with your morning coffee, allowing time for it to cool while you check in with your breath. Take a slow deep breath in through the nose, pause for a moment, and then breathe out through the mouth. You can use the box breathing technique, or simply find a rhythm that feels comfortable.

• Use a mindfulness app like Insight Timer or Headspace. You can enter the time you have available and you’ll find a wide range of guided meditations.

• Set a 5-minute timer and journal about anything that comes to mind.

Practice Mindful Transitions

Mindful task transitions can help you maintain your focus and prevent mental fatigue. Before moving on to a new task, appointment, or procedure, take a moment to pause, breathe deeply, and clear your mind.

You’ll be more present for your patient, which can build trust and connection. And this mindful pause can enhance your efficiency by helping to prevent the accumulation of mental clutter, or what is known as attention residue.

Embrace Single-Tasking

Multitasking used to be considered a prerequisite superpower for productivity. Doing two or more things at once--what could possibly go wrong? A lot, it turns out.

Emergency Department physicians may be the most pressed to multitask, with a recent Scandinavian study finding that almost 20 percent of their time is engaged this way. Not surprisingly, this study found that the more a physician multitasked, the more stressed they became. And other studies have found that multitasking can increase the risk for errors.

While you may not always have control over who or what interrupts you, it can help to remain mindful of the things that are pulling on your attention. When you are able to tune out distractions and put non-pressing matters on hold, you’re likely to be more productive and efficient with your time.

To tune up your ability to focus, regular meditation can help. That’s because mindfulness meditation is, at its foundation, a practice of returning your attention to the present moment.

Cultivate Presence

What exactly is presence? Actress Anna Deavere Smith, in her book Letters to a Young Artist, counsels that “Presence means you hold your own space, control the space around you, and sometimes welcome others into it.” Here she is describing the persona of an artist, but as a physician, you too are tasked with holding space, while simultaneously creating a place of safety for your patients to enter.

In being present, you are listening mindfully, without jumping to conclusions or judgments. You’re paying attention not only to the words but to the body language and, sometimes, to the unspoken fears beneath the words.

This might sound like it could add time to the encounter, but the truth is that when you lead with mindfulness, your patient is more likely to feel heard and safe. You are more apt to integrate information that might otherwise slip beneath your radar, so your differential may be more accurate.

And as you build trust, your treatment plan may be more readily accepted, and you’re likely to get fewer in-box messages or worried phone calls after the encounter.

End with Mindful Reflection

As you close out the day, take five to ten minutes to reflect on your “wins”, your “dones”, and your “to-dos”. Acknowledge both your successes and areas for improvement, without falling into self-criticism.

By creating a to-do list for the next day, you can set aside your lingering worries and unchecked boxes, knowing that you’ve made a plan to tackle them tomorrow.  

Your closing-down practice could even include stopping at a coffee shop on your way home to enjoy a cup of decaf and take a few minutes to journal and debrief before entering into your home life.

This time between work and home can also give you a safe space to decompress from your work day so that you’re able to be present for your loved ones, making the most of the time remaining in the day.

Conclusion

Mindfulness is not going to solve all that is troubling healthcare. It doesn’t mean pretending that the troublesome systemic problems facing physicians don’t exist. But by cultivating a mindful approach to the day, it’s likely that your time will be spent more meaningfully. And as a result, your focus and productivity will improve, and you’ll have more bandwidth to be present for your patients and your loved ones.

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