Compassion – Is it a ‘Must-Have’ in Healthcare?
In the healthcare industry, institutions implement strict qualifications and requirements when hiring employees. Nurses, for instance, must have completed necessary training and education, and in some cases, experience, to practise their profession. Aside from the basic requirements, they should also possess a variety of skills, such as flexibility and adaptability, confidence, and the ability to work with healthcare professionals and patients from different backgrounds.
What about compassion? Is it not a necessary requirement?
The standard of NHS care has recently been under scrutiny after reports of appalling neglect experienced by several patients in various hospitals and care homes. According to Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, such ‘poor care’ is apparently down to a lack of compassion among staff, and warned that a ‘culture of cruelty’ existed in certain organisations.
But in her report published in the journal Clinical Ethics, Dr Anna Smajdor, a lecturer and researcher in biomedical ethics at the University of East Anglia, argued that compassion ‘is not a necessary component’ in the healthcare industry. According to her, medics should be able to perform their tasks without being kind to patients, and that healthcare professionals who care too much about their patients would become demoralised if they witness neglect or poor treatment on wards. Reported in Daily Mail, Dr Smajdor said ‘Unless we regard healthcare professionals as saints, we cannot demand that they guarantee an unlimited flow of compassion for each patient. Indeed, it is not only unfair, but dangerous to do so.’ She added that those who feel compassion may become ‘deeply distressed if they witness poor care on wards. As a result, these people are more likely to suffer from burnout and fatigue, and this may ultimately lead to damaged healthcare system.
So, can healthcare institutions go well without compassion?
To understand the role of compassion in the healthcare industry, it is necessary that we define what it is. In her argument, Smajdor defines compassion as ‘the feeling or emotion, when a person is moved by the suffering or distress of another, and by the desire to relieve it; pity that inclines one to spare or succour’. The problem is that compassion is a complex concept. For psychologists, it is more than ‘putting oneself in the other person’s place’. The word ‘pity’ may not suffice to demonstrate what compassionate really is. Compassion, as many experts would agree, is the ability to understand the emotional state of another person or oneself, and has the added element of having a desire to alleviate or reduce the suffering of another. And even though empathy and compassion are two separate things, having compassion for someone can lead to feelings of empathy to that person.
It is true that most tasks in the hospitals can be performed and completed without compassion. For instance, surgeons can remove a kidney without being compassionate to the patient, and could successfully administer the procedure as long as he or she does it with expertise and care. But there are certain tasks that require more than performance – those that require the consideration of the patient’s values and interests. In palliative care for instance, healthcare professionals must have an understanding of what the situation feels like for the patient, as well as the desire to alleviate one’s suffering, so they can offer the right level of care that each patient needs.
Last September, researchers from The Schwartz Centre for Compassionate surveyed 800 patients and 510 physicians and found a deep compassion gap in the healthcare industry. Published in the journal Health Affairs, their findings suggest that compassionate care is ‘very important’ to the success of medical treatment. However, only 53 per cent of patients and 58 per cent of physicians said that the health care system generally provides compassionate care. In this particular study, the researchers defined compassion as the ‘intersection between empathy and sympathy, that is, when a caregiver genuinely understands a patients’ concerns and senses the emotional as well as the purely physical nature of the person’s medical condition’. Such care, the researchers add, ‘addresses the patient’s need for connection and relationships and is based on attentive listening and a desire to understand the patient’s context and perspective’. At the end of the report, the authors recommend making compassionate care a part of the national quality standards, and that such care be a ‘priority for comparative effectiveness research to determine which aspects have the most influence on patients’ care experiences, health outcomes, and perceptions of health-related quality of life; and that payers reward the provision of such care.’
Compassion, as most would agree, should be something that must be innately engrained into a person’s being. It is supposed to be something that, despite one’s profession, gender, age or status in life, should demonstrate. That is, compassion is part of being human. Whilst some experts believe that compassion is not necessary in the healthcare industry, more and more scientific proofs are pointing that it is. After all, healthcare is not just about giving adequate treatments and restoring patients’ health, but also about giving genuine care that uplifts their well-being. That’s probably why it’s called ‘healthcare’.
Do you think compassion is necessary in the healthcare industry? Why or why not? Share your insights by posting a comment below.
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