Impact of burnout on empathy

Abstract

Aim: Burnout has a damaging effect on both the wellbeing of medical professionals and patients alike. Empathy is an important part of the therapeutic relationship and could be damaged by burnout. We aimed to describe the prevalence of burnout, assess levels of empathy and explore the relationship between burnout and empathy among senior medical officers (SMOs). We hypothesised that there would be a negative correlation between empathy and burnout.

Method: This was a cross-sectional observational study involving SMOs from a variety of specialities. The focus is on SMOs with relatively prolonged contact times with patients. Email invitations were sent out requesting participation in an electronic survey on the QuestionPro platform. The survey comprised 42 questions enquiring about demographics, empathy (Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy) and burnout (Copenhagen Burnout Inventory). Correlational analyses were performed.

Results: Three hundred and fourteen invitations were sent out and 178 responses were received (56.7% response rate). Forty-five percent of SMOs surveyed were experiencing high levels of personal burnout. There was a statistically significant negative correlation between empathy and patient-related burnout (p=0.018).

Conclusions: The results show high levels of personal burnout among SMOs and suggest that empathy reduces as patient-related burnout increases. The nature of this relationship is a complex one, and other contributing variables should be considered.