Have been stressed so taken sick days for colds and respiratory illnesses. I feel bad to take days off because my hospital is working on a skeleton team so if one person is down, that means another person has an extra 10-15 patients on their list to sort.

At the same time i feel not right to patients for being in if i’m sneezing/coughing.

I’m now kind of feeling run down after i powered through a 12 hour shift while being ill and feeling like i wanted to keel over multiple times. I told my colleagues i was sick and would appreciate leaving early. No one stepped up to take charge for the day - so i ended up doing much more than i anticipated doing while being sick.

I’m doing a shit job today- bare minimum to keep the gears running. I’ve no energy or tolerance for anything else (family meetings, disgruntled entitled patients, demanding nurses).

My non medic partner cautioned me to leave early as it could be flagged to management (who have noticed i’ve been sick often - well yes because i’m stressed and burning out from heavy shifts, take up more on a regular basis and work my ass off when i’m well to the point i keep getting chest infections). It annoys the HELL out of me that my non medic partner told me “if you can stand and walk, well…” and “you weren’t sneezing yesterday night”.

I put my patients, my colleagues, my partner before me any day and go extra miles when i can. Its annoying that my partner thinks my 12 shift is comparable to a busy day at the office.

What are people’s thoughts on sick days as doctors?