Medical Bullying and Physician Suicide: Laura Silinskyte’s Story

In early May, a Lithuanian doctor named Laura Silinskyte committed suicide after facing constant bullying from her superiors at her regional hospital. To shed light on the issue of medical bullying and physician suicide, Chadi is joined by two friends of Dr. Silinskyte—Monika Arzanauskaite, a radiologist, and Gil Morgan, a medical oncologist—as well as a personal friend Laurie Gordon, an adult and child psychiatrist with experience treating healthcare workers. Monika and Gil share who Laura was as a person and some insight into her life leading up to her final days, how the outdated and hierarchical structure of the health system in Lithuania likely contributed to her final decision, explain the differences between “bullying” and “mobbing,” and wrap up with what can be done by the medical community to keep a tragedy like this from happening again.