It's been said that nurses are the heart of healthcare. Has there ever been a truer statement? Just as the human heart is to the body, nurses are to care settings. In the physical sense, nurses are the driving force behind patient interactions. They identify patients’ needs, monitor treatment plans, perform evaluations, draw blood, and so much more. In the figurative sense, they offer the understanding and empathy that bring an often lacking human element to healthcare. It is this latter point, compassionate care, that we will explore more deeply.
Compassionate Care in the AACN Essentials
Compassionate care is 1 of 8 professional nursing practice concepts discussed in the AACN Essentials. It is a crucial element of the person-centered care domain and even plays a role in nursing professionalism. Compassionate care “refers to the way nurses relate to others as human beings and involves ‘noticing another person’s vulnerability, experiencing an emotional reaction to this, and acting in some way with them in a way that is meaningful for people.’”1 It can foster greater patient satisfaction and care outcomes, making it an invaluable skill for nursing students to develop.
Compassionate Care Across Multiple Domains
The AACN offers a compassionate care tool kit to help you identify important learning objectives for entry-level and advanced students:2
Entry Level
- Understand the key elements and qualities of compassion in nursing practice.
- Examine system-level factors that can affect providing compassionate care.
- Explore how individual implicit and explicit biases can affect the provision of compassionate care, and how these can be ameliorated through self and systemic evaluation.
- Examine how to provide compassionate care.
Advanced
- Assess methods for skillfully implementing compassion in nursing practice.
- Analyze system-level factors that impede or facilitate the provision of compassionate care.
- Evaluate methods for limiting individual and systemic implicit and explicit biases that can reduce the provision of compassionate care.
- Appraise and strengthen the ability of students to provide compassionate care.
Teaching Your Students to Embrace Compassionate Care
Compassionate care has repeatedly been shown to make a positive difference for patients and nurses alike. However, effectively utilizing it isn’t as straightforward as it might seem. Literature suggests that students and junior nurses often lack compassion when providing care.3 This finding highlights how critical it is for nurse educators like you to discuss what compassionate care is, what it looks like, and how it improves patient health.
Being Nice Isn’t Enough
When your students hear the word compassion, they might think of terms like sympathy or pity. Without proper context, it’s easy to misunderstand what compassionate care actually means. It has less to do with feeling sorry for patients or being nice, although these are usually factors, and more to do with providing an environment where patients feel safe and comfortable to open up.
What Compassionate Care Looks Like in Practice
Being compassionate as a nurse can feel like walking a tightrope. On one hand, you want to empathize and show that you understand where a patient is coming from. You want to be sincere. Conversely, you want to avoid getting too emotionally attached or coming across as intrusive. This balance can get tricky when working with patients of different ages, personality types, cultures, socioeconomic conditions, etc. To help your students find the right balance, we suggest sharing the following best practices for showing an appropriate level of compassion in nursing practice:
- Actively listen to your patient and their loved ones, and give them someone to talk to if they need it.
- Show genuine interest in your patient, their feelings, and their concerns.
- Be empathetic and provide emotional support when needed.
- Remain patient and calm. For example, take the time to politely explain procedures and answer questions.
- Use a positive tone of voice and appropriate body language.
- Respect your patient’s need for privacy with small gestures like knocking before entering.
- Stay present and mindful of shifts in emotion.
Your students should also be made aware of impediments to providing effective, compassionate care, such as time limitations, personal biases, poor team cohesion, language barriers, lack of resources, and related factors.
Ways Compassionate Care Improves Patient Outcomes
When a patient feels like a nurse is on their side, it can go a long way in improving health outcomes. Here are several key examples to emphasize with your students:
- Actively listening and getting to know a patient can build trust, improve communication, and reveal important health issues or complaints.
- Being friendly and positive can instill a sense of reassurance and confidence.
- Explaining procedures and answering questions can ease patients' concerns, make them feel valued, and lower their stress levels.
- Showing a patient that you care about their well-being can get them more engaged in their own healthcare.
Using UWorld Nursing to Teach Compassionate Care
UWorld Nursing resources use real-world scenarios to help your students apply theory to practice. By incorporating them into your curricula, you can improve your students’ clinical judgment while emphasizing situations where compassionate care is needed.
- Our high-yield videos offer a time-efficient way to introduce essential concepts. Every video is designed to provide a clear understanding of the most important topics while also highlighting the crucial role of compassionate care in nursing practice.
- Include NCLEX-style items in your assignments that address compassionate care skills and concepts. Our assignments are designed to complement your teaching and help your students develop the empathy and understanding necessary for successful nursing careers.
- Utilize UWorld’s case studies as a foundation for your simulation program. This will effectively bridge the gap between lecture and lab and provide multiple opportunities for students to practice compassionate care concepts.
Creating a Future of Positive Healthcare Experiences
As nurse educators, we have a tremendous opportunity to promote compassionate care by giving students the perspective and knowledge they need to effectively interact with diverse patient populations. Developing quality compassionate care takes time and practice. By focusing on it throughout nursing school, your students can go on to provide more positive and fulfilling care outcomes during their careers.
