A recent Time magazine article, “Women Live Longer Than Men—But Not in Medicine,” confirmed what many of us have long felt in our bones: Being a woman in medicine comes at a cost.
A staggering one.
Women physicians are dying younger than male physicians. Younger than women in the general population.
And that’s just what the mortality data shows.
The morbidity—the chronic health issues, the emotional exhaustion, the unseen physical toll—is harder to quantify. But we feel it. We live it. And far too often, we normalize it.
The hidden burden of women physicians
Women physicians give so much.
We stay longer with patients.
We carry the unseen emotional labor of medicine.
We listen deeply.
We mentor and guide.
We say yes. Again and again.
We do this not because we have to but because we care.
And yet, we exist within a system that was not built for us—and does not care for us.
A system that demands more without recognizing the weight of what we are already holding. A system that takes advantage of our empathy, our devotion, our sense of duty. A system that trained us, under duress, to push through—no matter the cost.
Until our bodies force us to stop.
I know this cost firsthand.
Since becoming a physician, I have had five surgeries.
I have experienced multiple pregnancy complications.
I have spent many nights in an ICU with a non-pregnancy-related issue—as a mother of two small children, at the age of 34.
The profession I love hurt me.
And I am not alone.
We talk about burnout as if it is a personal failing. A mindset problem. A resilience gap.
But burnout is not a disease. It is a symptom of a profession structured for overwork, self-sacrifice, and depletion.
It is a direct result of a system that values productivity over presence, output over well-being, and efficiency over humanity.
We don’t need to leave medicine—we need to change how we practice it.
Too many physicians—especially women—believe the only way to reclaim their well-being is to leave medicine entirely.
But what if the answer isn’t leaving? What if the answer is changing how we practice?
We can reimagine medicine in a way that allows us to stay, thrive, and heal—rather than pushing ourselves to the breaking point.
To do this, we need a dual approach:
As individuals, we must unlearn the belief that exhaustion equals dedication and self-sacrifice equals success.
As a profession, we must change the structures, expectations, and leadership that determine how medicine is practiced.
This is why I do what I do.
After 18 years as a physician wellness leader within a large health care system, I created Pause & Presence because I believe medicine can and should be different.
I work with individual physicians to help them reclaim peace, sustainability, and well-being in their careers. But individual change will only take us so far.
If physician leaders don’t buy in, nothing changes.
That is why I also work with leaders across the country to “lead with a lens of wellness.”
Leaders set the tone. They create the structures, policies, and workplace cultures that determine how long physicians practice—and how long they live.
If we want to reverse this crisis, we need leadership that:
- Understands the cost of emotional labor and makes space for it.
- Recognizes that burnout is not a personal failure but a system problem.
- Models a culture where rest, boundaries, and sustainability are the norm—not the exception.
We cannot expect individual physicians to heal in a system that keeps breaking them.
A wake-up call we can no longer ignore
I hope this article in a mainstream publication will finally serve as a wake-up call.
Because so far, nothing else has.
We cannot afford to keep losing women physicians—to burnout, to exhaustion, to chronic illness, to premature death.
If we don’t change this now, we will continue to watch the next generation of women physicians suffer the same fate.
We don’t need to leave medicine. We need to change how we practice it—and how medicine is practiced.
It’s time.
Jessie Mahoney is a board-certified pediatrician, certified coach, mindfulness and yoga teacher, and the founder of Pause & Presence Coaching & Retreats. After nearly two decades as a physician leader at the Permanente Medical Group/Kaiser, she stepped outside the traditional medical model to reimagine what sustainable well-being in health care could look like. She can also be reached on Facebook and Instagram.
Dr. Mahoney’s work challenges the culture of overwork and self-sacrifice in medicine. She helps physicians and leaders cultivate clarity, intention, and balance—leveraging mindfulness, coaching, yoga, and lifestyle medicine to create deep and lasting change. Her CME retreats offer a transformative space for healing, self-discovery, and renewal.
As co-host of The Mindful Healers Podcast, she brings self-compassion and presence into the conversation around modern medical practice. A sought-after speaker and consultant, she partners with organizations to build more human-centered, sustainable, and inspired medical cultures.
Dr. Mahoney is a graduate of Dartmouth College and the University of California, San Francisco, School of Medicine.
