A novel study has found that a majority of health professionals go to work when they are sick. In fact, it would not be wrong to affirm they know the best in such a condition they should not go to work.

Julia Szymczak at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and colleagues conducted a survey in which 500 physicians, nurse practitioners, nurses, physician assistants and certified nurse midwives took part.

Majorly all of them have agreed that working while being sick can put their patient at risk. However, then also 83% of them said that they come to work while being sick at least once in the last year. Their ill health includes working with a fever, diarrhea and respiratory problem.

As per the survey, 99% have said that they have worked while they sick because they did not want to let their colleagues down. Another 95% said that they have worked because there was not enough workforce to handle the complete work and 92% said that they did not want to let down their parents. Another 64% said that they have worked when being sick as they feared that their colleagues will think wrong for them.

“Some respondents described a complete absence of a sick relief system in their clinical area, whereas others were aware that their area had a sick relief policy but reported it was not used in practice”, stated the researchers. It is suggested that hospitals and group practices should be made easy to call in sick.