Unfolding insights about resilience and its coping strategies by medical academics and healthcare professionals at their workplaces: a thematic qualitative analysis

Abstract Background Health care professionals (HCPs) and medical and health academics (MHAs) strive to maintain and promote population health through evidence-based medical education and practice. At their workplaces, due to the demanding nature of work, HCPs and MHAs face substantial degrees of physiological, psychological, and physical stress, including burnout. Resilience has therefore become a fundamental necessity in the medical field. Our research aimed to acquire an in-depth comprehension of how HCPs and MHAs understand, cultivate, and sustain resilience when confronted with workplace challenges and stressors. Methods We reviewed the existing corpus of literature about resilience, stressors, and coping strategies and followed an iterative deliberations process to develop an interview guide. The guide was validated by content experts and was piloted on a small group of MHAs of the University of Sharjah (UoS) and HCPs from different hospitals of the United Arab Emirates to test its relevance, internal consistency, and inter-observer validity. The validated interview guide was then administered for in-person interviews. Lastly, we adopted the Braun and Clarke 6-stage thematic model for qualitative data analysis. Results Our study recorded insights of 170 participants; 69 MHAs and 101 HCPs. Through an inductive thematic analysis, three overarching themes with sub-themes emerged; cognitive mastery (cognitive appraisal and problem-solving abilities), affective well-being (gratification from professional efficacy and social support), and conative efficiency (proactive approaches and introspection and reflection). Other main findings highlighted stress-related factors, realistic expectations, personal well-being and work-life balance. MHAs were concerned about academic output and research, while HCPs were stressed about patient care, delivery of services, and workload. These factors highlighted a complex interaction between cognitive mastery, emotional well-being, and conative efficiency. Conclusion The findings of our study bestow valuable insights into the dynamic nature of resilience in the medical profession. The synergies and dissimilarities in work-life balance, personal productivity, and job-specific stressors among HCPs and MHAs demand a well-structured resilience program. The themes of cognitive mastery, affective well-being, and conative efficiency are interconnected and can help foster work-life balance and personal well-being of HCPs and MHAs to improve their resilience.