In the healthcare industry, emotionally challenging situations are unavoidable. Whether you’re tasked with delivering a difficult diagnosis, or are constantly helping and caring for people in pain, it’s an ongoing part of the job. However, when people are constantly confronted with such difficult situations, it can seriously impact their personal wellbeing, and in many cases can result in compassion fatigue.
We’re very aware of this issue and have collated information to help you prevent compassion fatigue in yourself and your team, as well as indicators to help you spot where it might be occurring.
So, what is compassion fatigue?
Compassion fatigue is known as the physical and emotional exhaustion that results in a person experiencing a profound decrease in their ability to feel empathy. Often referred to as “the cost of caring”, it is characterised as a form of secondary traumatic stress from helping or wanting to help people experiencing pain and trauma.
Compassion fatigue is not something to be treated lightly. Its impacts can have serious ramifications on all aspects of your health. Further, it also has the potential to cause ethical and legal implications regarding the quality of care provided to clients and patients.
Who is at risk of developing compassion fatigue?
The people most at risk are the ‘helpers and healers’ of the world. Professions based on caring for others and regularly dealing with trauma and pain.
However, it’s important to understand that everyone has different risk factors for developing compassion fatigue. In fact, it is the people with the most empathy who are the most at risk, as they are more impacted by emotional material and therefore more vulnerable to it.
Risk factors are also extremely situational and highly dependent on people’s personal experiences and life events. For example, a team member with young children at home will likely be more sensitive to cases involving childhood trauma and pain. People who have limited personal boundaries plus a history of caring for others from an early age, are also more likely to develop compassion fatigue, as they often put others’ needs before their own.
How to spot compassion fatigue:
People can experience compassion fatigue very differently, however, there are symptoms to be aware of, both in assessing your own wellbeing and that of your team members. The following is a compilation of the many different symptoms that one may experience.
Feeling overwhelmed, hopeless, helpless or powerless over the suffering of others.
Feeling detached from experiences and surroundings.
Feeling burnt out, exhausted or numb – physically, emotionally or psychologically.
Decreased ability to show empathy.
Substance abuse.
Decreased tolerance for stress and anxiety.
Feeling hypersensitive or insensitive to emotional material.
Physical symptoms such as headaches, weight changes and difficulty sleeping.
Poor work-life balance and difficulties in personal relationships.
Decreased sense of career fulfilment.
How can you prevent it?
Fortunately, compassion fatigue is both highly preventable and treatable. Here are some strategies to implement in your practice to do just that.
Be aware of the signs, symptoms and risk factors of compassion fatigue and share these with your team. Many people find that ranking their level of compassion fatigue from 1 to 10 can be useful in maintaining awareness of their emotional capacities.
Make a practice of regularly checking in with your team members – especially if you know they have an emotionally challenging patient or case.
Encourage and support team members to practice a healthy work-life balance - separating their work and personal lives and integrating authentic and sustainable self-care practices into their lives.
Encourage team members to partake in professional development activities – this allows them to grow and expand their knowledge, as well as building their confidence and enthusiasm for their work.
Provide a supportive team environment and workplace culture. Try to maintain a positive mood in your practice through communication and use of tone – creating a norm of optimistic and positive attitudes can have a huge impact on maintaining a healthy workplace, especially in healthcare. But also know when a sombre and serious tone is the more appropriate.
If you notice yourself or your team members struggling, encourage them to take a break. Often, when it comes to compassion fatigue in the healthcare sector, the “work through it” mindset can be harmful rather than helpful, for both clinician and client. So, if you need a break, take a break.
After reading this, it’s important to remember that compassion is by no means a bad thing. In fact, it’s often the superpower that allows healthcare professionals to do their job – caring for the people most in need. And it is for this reason that it must be protected.
As well as implementing the above strategies, this resource could be great to share with your clinicians to help them to maintain a healthy level of empathy in their role.
The Augmentum team provides a broad range of consultancy and management services, supporting healthcare business owners and decision makers in other key areas such as strategy development and action planning, building effective foundations and teams, keeping your finger on the pulse, and driving growth and success. Get in touch to find out more, or check out our website www.augmentum.com.au
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