Mental health is essential for people to manage stress, work effectively, and contribute to their communities. At workplaces mental health problems like depression, anxiety, and substance abuse can lead to absenteeism and reduced productivity. In anatomy departments additional stress comes from high expectations, heavy workloads, and working with cadavers, which can impact both teachers and students.

Mental health of professors plays a big role in student motivation and success. When professors are not motivated and show the symptoms of burnout, it affects their teaching quality and the atmosphere during the classes. Those teachers suffering from burnout can feel exhausted, detached, and less productive, which is harmful for their well-being and for students’ performance.
 

Universities have to support mental health of the staff through preventive programs aiming at reducing work-related stress, work-life balance, and they should offer mental health services. These interventions can contribute to better teaching quality and student success.

It is challenging for every teacher to motivate their students to learn: some prefer to control them, while others support their independent ambitions. We can call these two approaches the teacher's motivational style, which is influenced by their training, personality, environment and many other factors. Students of those teachers who support autonomy usually perform better and are more engaged in learning. This knowledge can be important for teachers to be able to be self-reflective and to motivate themselves in alternative ways.