“You've Got Gratitude!”— A Multispecialty and Multi-institution Program Encouraging Expressions of Gratitude

Objective: Efforts to improve physician well-being have focused on gratitude, which predicts health and happiness. Despite reported benefits, expressions of gratitude in healthcare can seem infrequent. Here, we describe Gratitude-Grams, an intervention to cultivate expressions of gratitude throughout a department. Methods/Approach: Piloted in our Department of Surgery and adopted by others, Gratitude-Grams employs a web-based platform (Qualtrics). Program feedback was solicited during teaching conferences using an anonymous department survey. Results: Gratitude-Grams streamlines and encourages expressions of gratitude while minimizing maintenance, cost, and time. The platform has been highly utilized and well-received in our Department of Surgery. Conclusion: Expressing and receiving gratitude has been shown to be critical for well-being. Gratitude-Grams is a highly utilized, simple, and attainable system to support expressions of gratitude and is ready for rapid implementation.