In a rare move, the government has recognized overwork as the cause of a doctor's suicide, allowing his bereaved family to claim workers' compensation, family members said.

They told a news conference Wednesday that the Tokyo branch of the Fund for Local Government Employees' Accident Compensation conveyed the decision to the family earlier in the day.

The doctor, who held a managerial post at a Tokyo metropolitan hospital in Fuchu, western Tokyo, killed himself in 1999 at age 53.

``I hope this will become an opportunity to improve the severe work conditions at hospitals that drive people to commit suicide and (encourage a rise) in the number of doctors hired,'' said his 60-year-old wife.

The doctor had worked in the hospital's management since July 1997. He faced a serious shortage of staff doctors because of resignations or sick-leave absences.

The average monthly overtime hours he worked shot up to nearly 100 from January to June in 1999. The hospital was so lacking in doctors that the man had to treat patients himself in addition to his duties as hospital administrator, the family's lawyers said.

In autumn 1998, he wrote to the university from which he had graduated as it also supplied doctors for his hospital. He asked the university to send more doctors to his hospital.

``I am too busy. I will become ill if this continues,'' he wrote.

In July 1999, he took a month of sick leave because he had become too stressed to sleep.

In September that year, the day after the university denied his request to send a doctor, he took his life at home, the family said.(IHT/Asahi: December 31,2004)