Understanding the effects of Compassion Fatigue
Associated Health Systems Inc.
Celebrating 35 Years as a Leading Distributor & Canadian Manufacturer for Healthcare Facilities.
A strongly relevant occupational hazard seen today in health-care facilities is compassion fatigue. ??
"Compassion fatigue refers to the profound emotional and physical exhaustion that health- care workers can develop over the course of their career when they are unable to refuel and regenerate. They may notice a change in their ability to tolerate strong emotions in their patients, colleagues and loved ones or to listen to difficult stories. Over time, they may develop a detached stance and lose their ability to connect with patients. Researchers have found that compassion fatigue is a normal consequence of working in high-stress settings with heavy workloads, including busy hospitals, where staff are exposed to a large volume of cases, with little time to debrief and regroup. Compassion fatigue can also result from being exposed to too many patients with similar problems. Eventually, health-care workers may become desensitized and numbed out, which can affect the quality of care they provide."
Here are some strategies that may help you cope with how you are feeling:
??Build a support network, if you do not already have one.
??After a critical event, ask for debriefing at work when you need it. If it isn’t available, reach out to a therapist or to your employee assistance program.
??Find better ways to decompress at the end of a long day: Go for a run or a walk, play with your pets, journal, do yoga, meditate, spend time with children — yours or someone else’s.
??Practice mindfulness-based stress reduction: try it for three minutes a day, and gradually build up to 10-20 minutes.
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??Reduce your trauma inputs: take a look at the amount of traumatic material you are exposed to while watching the news and your favorite TV shows and when reading for pleasure.
??Advocate for a change in workload and more control over your schedule.
Citations quoted from:
Quoted Source: https://www.canadian-nurse.com/blogs/cn-content/2014/06/01/occupational-hazards-compassion-fatigue-vicarious