Dr. Rangan Chatterjee on the Effects of Workplace Stress

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: So, the book is “The Stress Solution.” How stressed are you right now on a scale of 1 to 10?

DR. RANGAN CHATTERJEE, AUTHOR, “THE STRESS SOLUTION”: A scale of 1 to 10, it is, what is that, Mid-December now? I’m going to say about seven to eight, maybe eight. Today, I’m going to say eight.

AMANPOUR: Because it’s cumulative?

CHATTERJEE: It’s cumulative. You know, I’m — I don’t think I’m anything unique, right. I’m busy. I’ve got two young children. I’ve got a wife. I’ve got a busy job. You know, I see patients. I release weekly podcasts. I write books. You know, I appear in public. I’ve got lots going on. And at the moment, I guess I’m feeling the pressure. So, I’ve got to be honest, I’m trying my best to apply a lot of principles that I write and talk about, but it can be challenging.

AMANPOUR: But that means you are the perfect infect perfect subject to be writing about because you are feeling all of these things the people in your generation and, you know, people in the workplace are feeling. Are you juggling too much, essentially?

CHATTERJEE: I think I’m juggling a little bit too much at the moment. And the thing is, you never really get to a perfect state of balance. We’re all looking for work-life balance as if it’s an endpoint that suddenly when we get there everything’s going to be blissful. But the reality is life always changes. Life shifts arounds. The stress is a serious problem. Let’s be really clear about this, the World Health Organization, according stress, the health epidemic of the 21st century. And actually, there was a paper in 2013, Journal of the American Medical Association, it was an editorial, I should say, where they suggested that 70 percent to 90 percent of all patients that come and see their doctor at any given day is in some way related to stress.

AMANPOUR: 70 percent to 90 percent?

CHATTERJEE: Yes.

AMANPOUR: You are a doctor. What do you find in your surgery?

CHATTERJEE: I see things like anxiety, insomnia, inability to concentrate, hormonal problems, type 2 diabetes, even things like obesity and high blood pressure, all of these seemingly separate problems can have stress as a root driver. And I think we really need to give stress a bit more attention, not only how wise for the problem is, but also some actionable solutions so people feel empowered.