Stress, Burnout and the Intention to Quit among Thai Dentists

Objectives: Intention to quit the profession contributes to shortage of dental practitioners. The objective of this study was to assess the influences of dentists' job stress and burnout on their intention to quit while controlling for demographic and practice characteristics. Methods: A mailed survey was conducted on a systematic random sample of 2,723 Thai dentists, 733 of which returned completed questionnaires. Intention to quit was assessed by dentists' inclination to quit the profession within the next 5 years. Job stress was measured by the 30-item Job Stress Inventory (JSI) which included 5 domains: Patient-related, Job Condition, Health System Reform, Job Characteristics and Time Pressure. Burnout was measured by the 22-item Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) – Thai version which included 3 domains: Emotional Exhaustion, Depersonalization and Personal Accomplishment. Stepwise logistic regression analysis was conducted to assess the influences of stress and burnout on intention to quit while controlling for demographic and practice attributes. Results: Overall, 13.9% of Thai dentists reported intention to quit. The logistic model of intention to quit identified 5 factors: age, the number of hours worked, being in private sector, high JSI: Job Characteristic domain, and high MBI: Emotional Exhaustion domain. Conclusion: This research confirms the influence of job stress on intention to quit the profession among Thai dentists. Retention strategies should target at improving psychosocial work environments. This research was supported by grant from the Faculty of Dentistry, Chulalongkorn University.