What is Burnout?
Burnout is a syndrome linked specifically to chronic workplace stress that hasn’t been successfully managed. Burnout is classified as an “occupational phenomenon”, not a mental health disorder or disease in itself. The three key dimensions are:
- Energy depletion/exhaustion
- Increased mental distance, negativism or cynicism about one’s job
- Reduced professional effectiveness or sense of accomplishment
At the same time, burnout is strongly associated with mental and physical health problems, including depression, anxiety, sleep problems, cardiovascular disease, and increased risk of errors and accidents. Burnout overlaps with depression and anxiety, but isn’t identical: depression tends to colour all areas of life, while burnout is more sharply tied to work or caregiving roles – though serious burnout can spill over into everything.
Burnout Symptoms
Everyone’s pattern is slightly different, but common features include.
Core features
- Persistent exhaustion: physical, mental and emotional tiredness that rest no longer fully fixes
- Feeling detached, negative or cynical about work: “I don’t care anymore”, “What’s the point?”
- Reduced effectiveness: you get less done, make more mistakes, or need far more effort to achieve the same results
- Loss of motivation: things you used to care about at work now feel meaningless or overwhelming
- Difficulty concentrating: “brain fog”, indecision, forgetfulness.
Burnout often develops gradually over months or years of high demands, low control/support and chronic stress.
Physical symptoms
Because burnout is work-linked, people sometimes overlook the body. But chronic stress can show up as:
- Constant tiredness, even after sleep
- Recurrent headaches, muscle tension, jaw clenching or back/neck pain
- Stomach or bowel problems (nausea, cramps, reflux, diarrhoea or constipation)
- More frequent colds or infections
- Changes in appetite or weight
- Sleep problems – difficulty falling asleep, waking early, or restless/unrefreshing sleep
- Palpitations, breathlessness on exertion, or feeling “keyed up” much of the time.
How it may feel day-to-day
Emotionally and psychologically, burnout can involve:
- Feeling trapped – like you can’t keep going but also can’t see a way out
- Irritability, impatience or emotional numbness – snapping at small things or feeling nothing at all
- Loss of joy – hobbies, social events or family time feel flat or like “more effort”
- Pulling away from colleagues, friends or loved ones
- Sense of failing at everything, even when others say you’re doing well
- Rumination – going over mistakes, emails or conversations late into the night
Burnout is common in high-responsibility, high-demand roles (healthcare, education, social services, leadership, tech, caregiving), but it can happen in any job where demands repeatedly exceed resources.
When to seek help
Seek urgent or emergency help immediately (e.g. emergency services or crisis line) if you:
- Have thoughts of self-harm or suicide, especially with intent or a plan
- Feel you might act impulsively in ways that could seriously harm you or others (e.g. unsafe driving, sudden risky behaviour)
- Are experiencing severe chest pain, difficulty breathing, or other symptoms that could indicate a medical emergency.
See your mental health professional promptly if:
- Exhaustion, sleep problems, stress or cynicism have been present for weeks or months and are not improving with rest
- Work stress is causing major problems in your health, relationships or performance
- You suspect you may also be experiencing depression, anxiety, trauma-related symptoms or substance use alongside burnout.
How Do You Assess for Burnout?
There’s no single blood test or scan for burnout. There are burnout questionnaires used mostly in research and organisational settings, such as the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory (CBI) and the Oldenburg Burnout Inventory (OLBI), but they cannot give a medical diagnosis by themselves and they cannot identify the nuances between burnout and depression and other mental health conditions. For a formal diagnosis of burnout:
- Start with a broad multi-condition mental health assessment: Because burnout often overlaps with depression, anxiety, trauma, ADHD and physical health conditions, a multi-condition tool like Loffty can help you:
- Map out stress, mood, sleep, concentration and other symptoms
- Flag whether what you’re experiencing looks more like burnout, depression, another condition, or a mix
- Create a clearer picture to take to your psychologist, psychiatrist or occupational health provider.
This avoids focusing only on “work stress” when there may be treatable conditions in the background.
- Clinical and occupational assessment: A psychologist, psychiatrist, or occupational health professional may explore:
- Work patterns: hours, shift schedules, demands vs control, role clarity, exposure to trauma or moral distress
- Symptoms: exhaustion, cynicism, sleep, cognition, mood, anxiety, substance use
- Impact on performance, safety, relationships and daily life
- Previous stress-related illnesses or mental health history
- Physical health: cardiovascular risk, chronic conditions, medication effects.
They may also screen specifically for depression, anxiety disorders and other mental health conditions, since these often coexist with or can be mistaken for burnout.
- Medical checks: Burnout itself isn’t a “disease” or "mental health disorder", but your specialist might order tests to:
- Rule out physical contributors (e.g. thyroid problems, anaemia, sleep disorders, chronic infection)
- Assess the impact of long-term stress (blood pressure, metabolic markers, etc.)
How Do You Treat Burnout?
Because burnout sits at the intersection of person and workplace, effective action usually needs both:
- Supporting you (rest, boundaries, skills, treatment), and
- Changing working conditions where possible (workload, support, culture, processes).
Foundations: what you can do personally (with support)
These are not a substitute for organisational change, but they help stabilise things:
- Prioritise sleep and basic care: treat rest, nutrition and movement as non-negotiable building blocks, not “rewards if you get everything done”.
- Create boundaries where you can: limits on work hours, email times, non-essential commitments; micro-boundaries (e.g. not opening work apps in bed).
- Build recovery into your day: short genuine breaks away from screens, breathing/reset exercises, time outdoors, things that actually feel restorative.
- Reconnect with values: even in a difficult job, noticing where your work still aligns with what matters to you can buffer against cynicism.
- Talk to someone safe: a trusted friend, partner, colleague, supervisor, coach, or therapist can help you think clearly when you’re exhausted.
Psychological therapies (often short-to medium-term) that can help with stress and burnout include CBT-based stress management, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), mindfulness-based approaches, and solution-focused or coaching-style work on boundaries and goals.
Workplace and organisational changes
Research is clear: organisational factors matter a lot. Meta-analyses and reviews show that both individual-level and organisational-level interventions can reduce burnout, particularly in high-risk sectors like healthcare, but that structural changes are crucial for lasting impact.
Helpful organisational changes might include:
- Adjusting workload and staffing: matching demands to resources, realistic caseloads and deadlines
- Increasing job control: more say over schedules, priorities and how work is done
- Improving role clarity and fairness: clear expectations, transparent decisions, equitable recognition and development
- Strengthening social support: psychologically safe teams, supportive supervision, peer debriefing (especially after traumatic events)
- Addressing values conflicts and moral distress: spaces to discuss ethical dilemmas, alignment between stated values and actual practices.
Other supports
Depending on severity and context, supports may also involve:
- Time off or reduced hours: sometimes via sick leave, sometimes negotiated adjustments
- Occupational health involvement and formal return-to-work plans
- Peer and professional support groups for high-risk professions
- In some countries, formal recognition of burnout in employment or compensation systems (this varies by jurisdiction).
If self-help and workplace conversations aren’t enough, or if depression, anxiety or trauma are also present, working with a mental health specialist can open up more structured treatment options.
Burnout Research
How common is burnout?
Prevalence estimates vary widely because definitions and measures differ, but research consistently shows high burnout rates in many sectors. Systematic reviews suggest high levels of burnout among health professionals globally, with particular concern in intensive care, emergency medicine and resident doctors.
Risk factors
Across studies, key risk factors include:
- High job demands and workload
- Low control over work, unclear roles, or frequent changes
- Poor leadership, lack of recognition or unfair treatment
- Limited social support at work
- Exposure to trauma, moral distress, or emotionally intense situations
- Misfit between personal values and organisational culture.
Burnout and depression – how different are they?
Research shows a strong but incomplete overlap between burnout and depression:
- Some analyses find substantial correlations, but also distinct patterns – especially around work-specific exhaustion and disengagement.
- Current evidence suggests burnout and depression are “close cousins, not twins”: related but not interchangeable, with implications for assessment and treatment.
Importantly, severe burnout is associated with a higher risk of suicidal thoughts, even after accounting for depression, another reason to take it seriously and seek support early.
Books and Resources About Burnout
- The Burnout Challenge: Managing People’s Relationships with Their Jobs. Christina Maslach & Michael P. Leiter (2022). Written by two of the leading researchers on burnout, this book focuses on how workplaces can change – not just how individuals should “cope better” – and outlines six key areas where job–person mismatches drive burnout. It emphasises that burnout is often a sign of “defective workplaces, not defective workers”, and that redesigning work is key.
- Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle. Emily Nagoski & Amelia Nagoski. A science-based, accessible book (especially popular with women) on how chronic stress affects the body and how to complete the “stress cycle” with practical strategies for rest, connection and recovery.
