The study’s results were based on survey responses collected between February and March 2024 from more than 10,000 physicians, independent of AMA membership status. Nearly half of the participants, 49.8%, were still practicing. More than four in five, 81%, were married or partnered, and of those who were not, 70.7% reported living alone.

The average loneliness score was 38.04 on the University of California, Los Angeles, Loneliness Scale, a 20-item survey instrument with scores ranging from 20 to 80.

Physicians 65–72 years old had a higher average score, 39.09, than those 73–80, 81–88, and over 89, who scored 37.22, 36.14 and 37.27, respectively.

“I didn’t expect this, because certainly you would think more people at those older ages would be living alone,” said Nancy H. Nielsen, MD, PhD, an older-adult physician who served as AMA president in 2008–2009.

“That makes me wonder if there’s an adjustment period—if those first few years in retirement are when it’s most difficult for physicians to figure out how to manage without being lonely,” said Dr. Nielsen, who is senior associate dean for health policy and clinical professor of medicine at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at University at Buffalo. She is still in practice as an internist and infectious disease physician.

While the study is not longitudinal and does not address causation, Dr. Nielsen suspects the incidence of loneliness may be on the rise, and she points to one cultural change that might account for some of it: the shift toward hospitalists.

“The thing I miss most is a place where doctors routinely get together—there’s no doctors’ lounge anymore,” she said. “We in private practice used to go to the hospital—everybody went to the hospital—and that doesn’t happen anymore. We had coffee together in the morning, and that’s when we got to know each other and really supported one another. You will hear many older physicians tell you that was a high point for them. Now physicians are more isolated in their settings.”

Dive deeper:

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A related report from the AMA, “Experiences of Ageism Among Senior Physicians: A Qualitative Study,” shows that many older-adult physicians experience ageist treatment. The report details the frequency and types of ageism they experience recommends ways to combat the phenomenon.

Notably, among U.S. physicians who have reported experiencing some type of differential treatment in any part of their lives due to their age, 18.8% said they had been treated as irrelevant or they had been dismissed, disrespected or made to feel invisible.

An episode of the AMA “Prioritizing Equity” video series delves into the critical issue of ageism in medicine, examining how age-related biases affect physicians and the quality of care they provide.

“Although there were no significant differences in mean scores among retired physicians and physicians practicing full or part time, it is notable that nearly half of participants still practiced medicine at the time of the survey, and that more than half of the high-loneliness cohort still practiced medicine,” the study’s authors wrote. “Considering this, it is evident that loneliness is not just a ‘retired physician’ concern.”

The authors also found higher loneliness scores among older-adult physicians who:

• Were not heterosexual, compared with those who were.
• Were not married or partnered, compared with those who were.
• Lived alone, compared with those who did not.
• Had no children or grandchildren, compared with those who did.
• Lived in rural areas, compared with those who lived in urban areas.

More research is needed “to observe potential causes of loneliness among senior physicians and potential associations with sense of purpose or loss of meaning-making activities,” the study says.

In the meantime, they wrote, there are steps stakeholders can take to reduce experiences of loneliness and improve well-being for older-adult physicians. For health care employers, these include establishing employee-resource groups that “provide opportunities for physicians to meet others who may be facing similar situations or life events.”

The AMA has numerous policies on aging, including those addressing:

• Dignity and self respect.
• Retirement and hiring practices.
• Assessing the competency of physicians across the professional continuum.
• Confronting ageism in medicine.

Dr. Nielsen noted that, in the end, senior physicians are not much different from other people 65 or older. Many older adults’ needs are universal.

“One common concern I hear from older physicians who live alone is this: What if something happens to me? Who’s there to help me? Who’s there to know?” she said. “This is a human phenomenon, not just an American phenomenon.”