Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Compassion Satisfaction and Compassion Fatigue Among General Surgeons: a Nationwide Cross-Sectional Study

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Indian Journal of Surgery Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

General surgery is a tough but satisfactory career that requires commitment, discipline, and self-sacrifice. The perception about his/her own life of the health care provider has consequences on the provider and the provided. The aim of this study is to evaluate the compassion satisfaction (CS), burnout (BO), and secondary traumatic stress (STS) among the general surgeons and to evaluate the effects of the demographics and occupational components on these experiences. This study was conducted between August and October 2019 in Turkey. A survey was performed among the general surgeons by using demographics and occupational information questions and the Professional Quality of Life Scale (ProQOL). The study group comprised of 399 surgeons who consented to participate and completed the survey are enrolled in the study. Among the participants, more than 95% of the general surgeons had average-high compassion satisfaction, and low-average burnout and secondary traumatic stress. The mean compassion satisfaction scores of the surgeons working in private and university hospitals were higher than the ones working in state hospitals and training/research hospitals, while the mean burnout scores were higher in state hospitals and training/research hospitals than the private hospitals. Surgeons working in the state hospitals and training/research hospitals have a lower quality of life than the other groups. Occupational stress and burnout prevention and intervention strategies should be developed in the hospitals in Turkey where the rates of occupational burnout are significantly high among surgeons.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Testa MA, Simonson DC (1996) Assessment of quality-of-life outcomes. N Engl J Med. 334(13):835–40. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJM199603283341306

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Stamm BH (2005) The ProQOL Manual. The Professional Quality of Life Scale: Compassion Satisfaction, Burnout & Compassion Fatigue/Secondary Trauma Scales. Idaho State University, Institute of Rural Health. Sidran Press. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.470.313&rep=rep1&type=pdf

  3. Barron DN, West E (2007) The emotional costs of caring incurred by men and women in the British labour market. Soc Sci Med 65(10):2160–71. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2007.06.027

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Stamm BH (2010) The Concise ProQOL Manual (2nd ed.). Pocatello, ID: ProQOL.org. https://proqol.org/proqol-manual

  5. Nunnally JC, Bernstein IH (1994) The assessment of reliability. Psychom Theory 3:248–292

    Google Scholar 

  6. Bell CC (1994) DSM-IV: diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders. JAMA 272(10):828–829

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Zakeri MA, Bazmandegan G, Ganjeh H, Zakeri M, Mollaahmadi S, Anbariyan A et al (2021) Is nurses’ clinical competence associated with their compassion satisfaction, burnout and secondary traumatic stress? A cross-sectional study. Nurs Open 8(1):354–363. https://doi.org/10.1002/nop2.636

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Figley CR (2002) Compassion fatigue: psychotherapists’ chronic lack of self care. J Clin Psychol 58(11):1433–41. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.10090

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Zeidner M et al (2013) Personal factors related to compassion fatigue in health professionals. Anxiety Stress Coping 26(6):595–609. https://doi.org/10.1080/10615806.2013.777045

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  10. Maslach C, Jackson SE, Leiter MP (1996) MBI manual, 3rd edn. Consulting Psychologists Press, Palo Alto, CA

    Google Scholar 

  11. Kang SH et al (2013) Analysis of the occupational stress of Korean surgeons: a pilot study. J Korean Surg Soc. 84(5):261–6. https://doi.org/10.4174/jkss.2013.84.5.261

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  12. Balch CM, Shanafelt T (2011) Combating stress and burnout in surgical practice: a review. Thorac Surg Clin 21(3):417–30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.thorsurg.2011.05.004

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  13. Bittner JGT et al (2011) Stress, burnout, and maladaptive coping: strategies for surgeon well-being. Bull Am Coll Surg 96(8):17–22

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  14. Wu D et al (2017) A preliminary analysis of compassion fatigue in a surgeon population: are female surgeons at heightened risk? Am Surg 83(11):1302–1307. https://doi.org/10.1177/000313481708301136

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  15. van Mol MM et al (2015) The prevalence of compassion fatigue and burnout among healthcare professionals in intensive care units: a systematic review. Plos One 10(8):e0136955. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0136955

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  16. Haik J et al (2017) Burnout and compassion fatigue: prevalence and associations among Israeli burn clinicians. Neuropsychiatr Dis Treat 13:1533–1540. https://doi.org/10.2147/NDT.S133181

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  17. Warren AM et al (2013) Does caring for trauma patients lead to psychological stress in surgeons? J Trauma Acute Care Surg 75(1):179–184. https://doi.org/10.1097/ta.0b013e3182984a7d

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  18. Allen R et al (2017) Minimising compassion fatigue in obstetrics/gynaecology doctors: exploring an intervention for an occupational hazard. Australas Psychiatry 25(4):403–406. https://doi.org/10.1177/1039856217700776

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  19. Shanafelt TD et al (2012) Burnout and satisfaction with work-life balance among US physicians relative to the general US population. Arch Intern Med 172(18):1377–85. https://doi.org/10.1001/archinternmed.2012.3199

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  20. Celik CSU et al (2021) Prevalence and associated factors for burnout among attending general surgeons: a national cross-sectional survey. BMC Health Serv Res 21(1):39. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-020-06024-5

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  21. El-Bar N et al (2013) Compassion fatigue, burnout and compassion satisfaction among family physicians in the Negev area - a cross-sectional study. Isr J Health Policy Res 2(1):31. https://doi.org/10.1186/2045-4015-2-31

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  22. Ghazanfar H et al (2018) Compassion satisfaction, burnout, and compassion fatigue in cardiac physicians working in tertiary care cardiac hospitals in Pakistan. Cureus 10(10):e3416. https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.3416

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  23. Patel R, Huggard P, van Toledo A (2017) Occupational stress and burnout among surgeons in Fiji. Front Public Health 5:41. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2017.00041

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  24. Dasan S et al (2015) Prevalence, causes and consequences of compassion satisfaction and compassion fatigue in emergency care: a mixed-methods study of UK NHS Consultants. Emerg Med J 32(8):588–94. https://doi.org/10.1136/emermed-2014-203671

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  25. Kwan KYH, Chan LWY, Cheng PW, Leung GKK, Lau CS (2021) Burnout and well-being in young doctors in Hong Kong: a territory-wide cross-sectional survey. Hong Kong Med J 27(5):330–337 https://doi.org/10.12809/hkmj219610

  26. Qureshi HA, et al. (2015) Burnout phenomenon in U.S. plastic surgeons: risk factors and impact on quality of life. Plast Reconstr Surg 135(2):619–626 https://doi.org/10.1097/PRS.0000000000000855

  27. Dyrbye LN et al (2013) Physician satisfaction and burnout at different career stages. Mayo Clin Proc 88(12):1358–67. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mayocp.2013.07.016

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  28. Bolat MS et al (2019) The prevalence of burnout syndrome among Turkish urologists: results of a nationwide survey. Turk J Urol 45(6):449–455. https://doi.org/10.5152/tud.2018.34202

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of General Surgery, Subdivision of Surgical Oncology, Ministry of Health Ankara City Hospital, Üniversiteliler caddesi Bilkent bulvarı no:1, Çankaya, Ankara, Turkey

    Metin Yalaza

  2. Department of General Surgery, Samsun Gazi State Hospital, Yenidoğan Mh. Aziziye Cad. No: 86, İlkadım, Samsun, Turkey

    Betül Keskinkılıç Yağız

Authors
  1. Metin Yalaza
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Betül Keskinkılıç Yağız
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Metin Yalaza.

Ethics declarations

Ethics Approval

This study was approved by the Ethical Committee of Ankara Numune Training and Research Hospital (approval no: 2679/2019). The study was performed in accordance with the ethical standards of the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Yalaza, M., Keskinkılıç Yağız, B. Compassion Satisfaction and Compassion Fatigue Among General Surgeons: a Nationwide Cross-Sectional Study. Indian J Surg 85, 329–336 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12262-022-03427-y

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12262-022-03427-y

Keywords

Search

Navigation