Why Compassion in Healthcare Counts!
Natasha Nicholas, Clinic Director, Three Points Clinic
2 min read
Keywords: compassion; care; self-care; self-compassion; patient; patient outcome
What is Compassionate Care and why does it matter?
It is easy to assume that compassion and healthcare go hand in hand but research suggests that compassion is lacking in healthcare and many would argue that there is a growing compassionate deficit in the world.
Fundamental to our role as healthcare and wellness professionals is caring for people who are suffering and in need of support. However recent studies and surveys are concluding that compassionate care varies greatly and that there are many variables influencing this.
Studies are finding that compassion in healthcare greatly enhances the quality of care, it improves patient concordance, bolsters patient outcomes, and strengthens therapeutic alliance which in turn can reduce the total cost of care and medical errors. Research is also finding that compassion extended to patients and clients by healthcare and wellness professionals may also lead to enhanced self-care. Compassionate care also includes self-compassion for the healthcare and wellness professional with compassion research finding compelling evidence that self-compassion is an essential ingredient in self-care, reducing clinician burnout, “compassion fatigue” and protecting the bandwidth professionals need to deliver consistent and intentional compassionate care.
So what is compassion? A working definition offered by Compassion researchers is a “concerned response to another’s suffering combined with a desire to alleviate the suffering of the other” (Monash University, Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences. 2022). Clinicians and wellness professionals must differentiate the concepts of empathy and compassion as the two concepts are very different and are represented in different areas of the brain. With empathy, we join the suffering of others who suffer but stop short of actually helping. With compassion, we take a step away from the emotion of empathy and ask ourselves 'how can we help?’. Empathy can accidentally turn into ‘empathetic distress’ ( the more appropriate term for compassion fatigue ), whereas compassion serves to protect the healthcare worker and helps to mitigate burnout.
Can we train ourselves to increase compassion?
The short answer is yes. We can prime ourselves for compassion by training in the components of compassion.
There are numerous compassion training courses specific to healthcare professionals given that healthcare workers have multiple demands placed upon them and are regularly confronted with the suffering of others. There can also be barriers to compassion which may make it challenging to cultivate. Compassion training provides healthcare workers with strategies to enhance and strengthen compassion in any situation.
Compassion training aims to:
• Increase understanding of compassion, how to support it, and the science that underpins it.
• Learn how to transform empathy into compassion to avoid accidentally going into empathic distress.
• Strategies for managing when compassion is challenging.
• Recognise and enhance the five moments of compassion.
• Strengthen the perception of common humanity to help cultivate compassion for anyone.
• Develop routines to sustain compassion in day-to-day work for increased wellbeing, improved patient care, and greater job satisfaction
Our Compassionate Care: for Healthcare, Wellbeing, and Allied Health Professionals, not only delivers these objectives but also explores models of Compassion and Self Compassion and aligns mindfulness and yoga principles and practices with these trainable domains to offer an additional set of tools to cultivate both compassion for others, self-compassion and how to bring these principles and practices into our role as carers.
This course can be delivered online , self-paced online or as a hybrid option. Please reach out if you would like to learn more about this course for your practice or facility.
A great starting point is our Introduction to Compassionate Healthcare, a 3 hour workshop that will introduce you to the science of mindful compassion and how it helps to offset “compassion fatigue” ; equip you will some tools to support the transition from empathy to compassion, begin to cultivate mindful self compassion, learn some mindfulness based stress reduction(MBSR) tools and we will end with a nourishing restorative yoga session.
This workshop will be held
Wellness In Motion
319 Pacific Hwy Lindfield
Saturday August 5th
1pm - 4,30pm
Cost: $60
For more information about call Natasha on 0408465928 or Jo on 0406029404. or simply head to booking link below.