Burnout test

Getting help for burnout

Most advice stops at "talk to someone". The harder part is knowing who does what, what you can ask each of them for, and what you are and are not obliged to tell them. Here is how the conversations divide up.

There are two conversations, not one

People approach burnout as a single problem to raise with a single person, usually their manager, usually badly timed. It goes better when you separate it into two tracks that run in parallel:

• The medical conversation, with your own doctor. Purpose: work out what is actually going on, rule out the things that mimic burnout, and get treatment or referral if it is warranted.
• The work conversation, with your employer and — where one exists — occupational health. Purpose: change the conditions. This is where the load, the hours and the responsibilities actually get adjusted.

Neither substitutes for the other. A doctor cannot reduce your workload. Your manager cannot tell you whether your exhaustion is burnout, depression or an underactive thyroid.

Your own doctor: start here

Go first, and go earlier than feels justified. The most valuable thing a GP does at this stage is not to confirm burnout — it is to check the alternatives. Thyroid problems, anaemia, vitamin deficiencies, sleep apnoea, the long tail of a viral infection and depression all produce months of exhaustion that feels exactly like burnout from the inside, and several of them are straightforwardly treatable once found.

What to bring. A rough timeline (when it started, what it was like six months ago), two or three concrete examples rather than adjectives — "I reread the same email four times" lands better than "I can't concentrate" — how your sleep has changed, and what you have already tried. If you have taken a burnout self-assessment, bring the result; it is not a diagnosis, but a printed set of scores across four dimensions is a more useful starting point than trying to summarise months of feeling awful in a ten-minute appointment.

What to ask. Whether anything physical should be ruled out and how; whether what you are describing sounds like it has a depressive component (see burnout or depression?); what support is available and how long the waits are; and — if you need it — what documentation they can provide for work, and what it will and will not say.

Occupational health: whose side they are on

Many countries have a distinct occupational physician role — a doctor engaged by or for the employer, separate from your own. This is the single most misunderstood part of the system, and the misunderstanding costs people.

The general principle almost everywhere is that they advise the employer on your capacity for work — what you can and cannot currently do, what adjustments would help, how a return might be phased — and not on your diagnosis, which stays medically confidential. In practice that means you can be considerably more open with them than with your manager, and the thing they pass on is a recommendation about work, not your medical history.

The details genuinely vary by country, and so does how much weight the employer must give the advice. If you are in the Netherlands, Germany, Spain or France, the version of this page in your language covers how the system actually works where you are. Elsewhere, it is worth asking directly at the start of the first appointment: what gets reported back, to whom, and in what form. It is a reasonable question and they are used to it.

Your manager: ask for changes, not sympathy

In most countries you are not required to disclose a diagnosis to your employer — only, where relevant, your fitness for work and any adjustments you need. Rules vary and it is worth checking yours, but the practical upshot is usually that you can have this conversation entirely in terms of capacity and workload without discussing your health.

What makes the conversation work:

• Be specific about the load, not the feeling. "I'm holding six projects and can do four well" is actionable. "I'm overwhelmed" invites sympathy and changes nothing.
• Propose the adjustment. Arriving with a concrete proposal — which things pause, which move, for how long — is far more likely to produce a decision than arriving with a problem.
• Ask for it in writing. Verbal agreements about workload evaporate at the next reorganisation, and you will not have the energy to renegotiate.
• Set a review date. Adjustments without an end date tend to be quietly reversed; adjustments with a review date get reviewed.

If the honest answer is that nothing can change, that is important information — but establish it rather than assuming it while you are too depleted to see any option clearly. What to do about burnout covers why changing employer without changing the pattern often reproduces it.

If you are not currently working

Burnout is defined in relation to work, but it does not require a current employer. Unpaid care work, study and job-hunting after being burned out by a previous role all produce the same picture, and the medical half of this page applies unchanged.

What is missing is the occupational health route, which is usually tied to employment. Your own doctor becomes the main path, and depending on where you live there may be public mental health services or employment-support schemes you can access directly.

If you are having thoughts of harming yourself, do not wait for an appointment. Contact your doctor, your local emergency number, or a suicide prevention line in your country today.

Common questions

Do I have to tell my employer I have burnout?

In most countries, no. The usual position is that you are obliged to discuss your fitness for work and any adjustments you need, not your diagnosis, and occupational health is bound to report on your capacity rather than your medical details. Rules vary by country and sometimes by contract, so it is worth checking your own — but you can generally have the whole workload conversation without naming a condition.

What should I actually say to my doctor?

Lead with duration and function rather than adjectives: how long it has been going on, and what you can no longer do that you could before. Two or three concrete examples beat a general description. Mention sleep specifically, mention anything physical, and say what you have already tried. If you have a burnout self-assessment result, bring it — as a starting point, not as a diagnosis.

Is what I tell occupational health confidential?

Broadly, your medical information is; their advice to your employer about your capacity for work is not, and is not meant to be. The specifics vary by country, so ask at the start of the first appointment what gets reported, to whom and in what form. It is a routine question.

Should I take sick leave for burnout?

That is a decision for you and a doctor together, and it depends heavily on what is available where you live and what would change on your return. The general finding is that time off helps most when it is used to change something rather than only to rest, and that phased returns tend to work better than abrupt full-load ones. Full stop-and-restart with nothing altered is the pattern most likely to repeat.