Burnout and thyroid dysfunction confuse a lot of people at first glance because the symptoms almost mirror each other.
There’s a specific kind of exhaustion many South Africans have normalised.
The kind where you wake up tired, push through work on caffeine and survival mode, forget what resting actually feels like and joke about being “burnt out” while your body quietly waves a red flag.
As conversations around mental health, workplace burnout and chronic fatigue continue to grow, doctors are warning that many people may actually be mistaking thyroid dysfunction for stress-related exhaustion and the overlap is frighteningly easy to miss.
According to Dr Fatima Hoosain, a specialist general surgeon and the principal at the South African Breast, Endocrine and Bone Centre, millions of people globally experience fatigue without understanding its real cause.
