Helping people is a very necessary and extremely hard occupation. Not every person has a passion to help others, thus very few people can be care givers. This job is very stressful and difficult. Caring victims or seriously ill men nurses face negative emotions, suffering, and anxiety. Thus, sometimes caregivers become disappointed, exhausted and unable to do their work. Their constant stress and pervasive negative attitude are the consequences of the features of the job and called compassion fatigue. This phenomenon, its peculiarities and the steps to prevent it will be carefully analyzed in this paper.
Warning signs for compassion fatigue Caregivers, doing their job, always have the professional risk to get moral trauma, empathetic strain and become burn-out. These few mentioned symptoms are also called compassion fatigue. This is the specific illness of above mentioned professional groups. Compassion fatigue can be accompanied by mental, physical, spiritual, and emotional exhaustion. This can lead to inability to rejoice or have at least some positive emotions. This is the warming sign for the concept which is called Counter Compassion Fatigue with Mindfulness.
Mentioned disease has the broad range of symptoms. Consequently, there is the necessity to mention at least few of them. Thus, caregivers are exposed to face the lack of enjoyment in their personal life, undue fatigue, and overheating. In addition, these people become to spend a lot of money for unnecessary things, blame others unreasonably and also have some physical problems the most common of which are toothache, headache and abdominal pain (A hospital-wide approach to combating compassion fatigue). All above mentioned are connected with the Combating compassion fatigue concept.
According to a hospital-wide approach, all symptoms are divided into four sections: psychological, emotional, physical and professional. In addition to mentioned signs of first type there are sleep disturbance and permanent pessimism. The second group includes feeling hopeless and powerless, anxious and irritability. Apart from mentioned physical symptoms a person can also fell itself tired. The last group of symptoms, professional, can be expressed in the unwillingness to do the work and reluctance to communicate with friends and relatives (Counter Compassion Fatigue). Nature of the problems and causes.
The manager of the heath care setting can face the problem of low morality and discontent of the personnel. This general dissatisfaction can affect the quality of services provided by caregivers. In order to neutralize negative these consequences, working conditions should be increased significantly. This task can be fulfilled by the enjoyment of the personnel from their work. Thus, the staff has to understand the importance of its job, realize how it is important to deliver qualitative services, and, at the same time, they should know that the company cares of their welfare and well-being (Combating compassion fatigue).
It seems to be very important, if to analyze the list of nurse’s duties. She responsible for proper and timely caring for the sick, which are very demanding; she also is obliged to complete clinical documentation and use all her knowledge and skills on purpose to provide the excellent service. In addition, there is the urgent need to emphasize the fact that the discharge of duties associated with a strong moral and psychological stress. Consequently, the professional illnesses, like compassion fatigue, progress very fast and the administration should prevent it.
For instance, this can be carried out by expanding the number of employees and increasing wages. Therefore, the caregivers will have enough time both to perform their duties properly and to break from the constant stress (Moeller, 2010). Physical, emotional and spiritual needs of caregiver The effective prevention and control of professional diseases can be carried out by satisfying the wants of caregivers. The employee should realize that he or she and the other workers have the problems, which have to be resolved.
In order to avoid professional illnesses, each member of the team should be aware of signs and symptoms and execute necessary actions promptly. First, the caregiver should maintain the stability, or, in other words, to have the balance of the body and mind. It allows not responding to external stimuli. Second, it is extremely necessary to have breaks, which give the ability to distract from work. Third, is to attend sports activities in their free time and provide themselves with the healthy food. In addition, a good music can also help to avoid or reduce stress and moral tension (Figley, 2002).
The emotional needs can be satisfied by the way of establishing the employee assisted programs. This way of dealing with compassion fatigue is very popular among the health care settings. It helps to understand the needs of the personnel and deal with emotional troubles or stress. The employee rounding is also quiet useful way. It is a very good method to discuss the problems of staff (Adams, Boscarino & Figley, 2006). The spiritual needs should also be considered. The simplest way to exercise these demands of workers is to provide them with ability to pray or do some meditation.
In general, ten minutes will be enough to calm down and regain moral balance. Coping strategies The management team of a health care setting has the broad range of ways, how the compassion fatigue of workers can be reduced or neutralized. Thus, many institutions have classes such as communication skill classes or classes for conflict resolution which can help staff avoid the difficulties of their job. Furthermore, hospital administration can organize meetings with workers, on which every person can share its problems and express thoughts concerning the improvement of working conditions.
The managers should be aware of the signs and symptoms of the compassion fatigue, because the timely help can prevent serious consequences. References Adams, R. E. , Boscarino, J. A. , & Figley, C. R. (2006). Compassion fatigue and psychological distress among social workers: a validation study. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 76 (1), 103-108. A hospital-wide approach to combating compassion fatigue. (n. d. ). Retrieved from http://www. hospitalimpact. org/index. php/2012/02/08/a_hospital_wide_approach_to_combating_compassion_fatigue Combating compassion fatigue. (n. d. ).
Retrieved from Nursing Made Incredibly Easy: http://journals. lww. com/nursingmadeincrediblyeasy/Fulltext/2010/07000/Combating_compassion_fatigue. 1. aspx Counter Compassion Fatigue with Mindfulness. (n. d. ). Retrieved from http://mindfulhub. com/archives/2011/08/combating-compassion-fatigue-with-mindfulness Figley, C. R. (2002) Compassion fatigue: Psychotherapists’ chronic lack of self care. Journal of Clinical Psychology 58 (11), 1433-1441. Moeller, S. D. (2010). Compassion fatigue. Routledge: New York. Pastoral Care. (n. d. ). Retrieved from Baylor Healthcare System: https://www. mybaylor. com/go/MyBaylor/4100/DesktopDefault. aspx.