For many of us, it doesn’t take much convincing to go on vacation. Unfortunately, many different factors come into play when you’re a practice owner or if you’re such a valued member of your team that your absence is significantly felt when you’re gone. Worry not, it actually could be beneficial to everyone if you took that time off to check out.
And yes, that means not a working vacation, where you’re still scrolling through emails every chance you get wifi but actually spending some time away!
Imagine kicking back in a hammock, enjoying your favorite beverage, with a light breeze gusting by…
If that hasn’t sold you how about some scientific reasons:
Better Sleep
Whether you’re using the FitBit App to track your sleep patterns or just noticing that you’re not getting the best sleep possible, it can easily become a problem that affects your work, which can turn into a patient safety issue.
Do you have too much on your mind? Interrupt the habits that disrupt your sleep with a vacation. If you have stress from work and you find your sleep is disrupted because of anxiety or tension, take time off and learn to reset your sleep pattern.
Heart Disease Prevention
Many studies highlight cardiovascular health benefits as related to taking vacations. Did you know that in skipping these physical and mental getaways you could actually be putting yourself at risk of heart disease/ heart attacks? Even missing one year’s vacation was associated with a higher risk of heart disease. Studies also show that women may also be significantly at risk of heart health issues once vacations are skipped over numerous consecutive years.
Improved Productivity
We’re all looking for more ways introduce more efficiency into our work. But did you know vacations can help increase productivity? Unfortunately, in our rush to get more done in less time we forget about the tools necessary to also be consistent in that sort of productivity. Some internal studies have shown considerable productivity results simply with 10 hours of vacation taken. Even better, it was found that the more frequent vacationers were actually less likely to leave the firm. Other studies have shown that requiring high-level professionals to take time off significantly made these individuals more productive than those with perfect attendance.
Stress reduction
We’ve all been a victim of stress from work, even if it isn’t particularly a stressful environment per se. For medical professionals stress is a given since your decisions have tangible effects on patients. The American Psychological Association concluded that vacations actually work to reduce stress by breaking up the monotony of the environment and activities that they associate with stress and anxiety in the first place by removing individuals from said atmosphere. In the same way, a Canadian study of about 900 lawyers found taking vacations helps alleviated job stress. Did you know that these effects were found to last beyond the duration of the vacation, too? The University of Vienna found that after taking the time away from work, vacationers had a reduction in stress-related physical complaints such as headaches, backaches, and heart irregularities. The best part this improvement was sustained as long as 5 weeks later!
So, where are you headed for your next getaway?