The medical field naturally attracts high achievers—individuals who are driven, conscientious, and resilient. However, several factors contribute to the high levels of perfectionism among physicians:
Training Environment: Medical training often emphasizes flawless performance and can be unforgiving of mistakes.
Responsibility: The stakes in medicine are incredibly high. Physicians are acutely aware that their decisions impact lives.
Culture: There’s a pervasive culture in medicine that equates perfection with competence and errors with incompetence.
Professional training: physicians have not been provided with the training to understand how trauma shows up in patient encounters, leading to a misunderstanding of patient non-compliance and resistance.
Ethical Dilemmas: Physicians work at a convergence of several demands, including administration, third-party payors, patient needs, workplace dynamics, and professional ethics. These competing demands rarely unify.