Compassion Fatigue Case Study Summary

Social Work is a helping profession that strives to help the community on micro, mezzo, and macro levels. It is an investment of self to offer services and help to those in need. Areas of service can include, but are not limited to, traumatic situations, family situations, and child protection. As in most social service professions, the field of social work can often times take a toll on the emotional and physical stability of a social worker. One side effect from working in a helping profession is compassion fatigue. As a result, the National Association of Social Workers stresses the importance of self-care and its vitality in ensuring the social worker does not get burnt out by the profession.

Social workers deal with intense situations daily. It is important that social workers are aware of how they are affected by these interactions. Priscilla Dass-Brailsford explains in her book, that countertransference, vicarious trauma (VT), secondary traumatic stress, compassion fatigue and satisfaction, and burnout are all different ways that counselors can be affected (Dass-Brailsford, 2007). This is where it is important for social workers to have a plan of self-care and stress management resources to use.

Scope of the Problem – It has been reported that 16-39% of registered nurses have experienced compassion fatique, and 8-38% experienced burnout.

This paper explores the emotional differences that people in the health care profession experience when it comes to the death of a patient. It defines the bereavement role, the four tasks of mourning, disenfranchised grief, compassion fatigue and how ambiguity and a lack of social acceptance can lead to decreased quality of patient care. In conclusion, the author offers an opinion of how to better manage the grieving and mourning process of care providers from an industry-wide standpoint.

Two hours until shift change and Sally Smith, RN was looking forward to going home and putting her aching legs up on the ottoman and drinking an ice cold Coke. She was thinking to herself that the patients were so needy all the time, she felt she gave them all she had and still all she had was not enough. All Sally heard was “get me this” and “get me that”…

A person’s current life’s circumstances, history, coping style and personality type all determine how compassion fatigue will impact them. If a person is encountering any other stress outside work, then that person is highly likely to experience compassion fatigue, on the other hand a person who is not experiencing any outside stressors may not arrive at that final stage in the process of CF. Study have shown that a person’s history affects the way in which he/she is affected by traumatic events. Psychologies implemented a theory in which variables, measure exposure to stressful events; the survey inquired about a number of negative life events (e.g., getting divorced, having problems at work) that could have happened

I believe anyone involved in the medical field needs the information about compassion fatigue due to its importance. It affects everyone involved in the health care field including all staff, patients, and even the organization itself. I believe not only the clinical staff but also the administrative staff should have yearly mandatory in-services on the subject of compassion fatigue. I also believe it is important for the board members to have all of the information on compassion fatigue, because organizational symptoms include high absenteeism, lack of vision for future of the company, negativism towards management, lack of flexibility among staff members, inability of staff to respect deadlines, inability of staff to complete assignments,

Occasionally, a major disaster strikes people with whom the viewer in an industrialised country can personally identify without difficulty. Jonathan Benthall (1993) suggests that Western media can at times be preoccupied by the fate of a ‘single, identified person such as a boy who has fallen down a well in Italy, or examples such as hostages, hijack victims, or small children whose lives could be saved by expensive advanced surgery’ [p.196]. Although the literature on what motivates charitable giving is relatively sparse, a series of recent studies in decision psychology have produced some interesting findings that support Benthall’s statement. Small and Lowenstein (2007) conducted a field experiment that demonstrated when asked to contribute

In the field of medicine, there is large debate over something known as “compassion fatigue.” Some say it exists while others claim it doesn’t. I believe the reason people debate the idea of compassion fatigue being a reality is due to a misunderstanding in how compassion fatigue manifests.

Compassion fatigue, sometimes called secondary trauma, is when an individual is around a person’s/people’s trauma so that that they themselves begins to be impacted emotionally, mentally, spiritually, and/or relationally. A person can also experience a form of compassion fatigue, known as vicarious trauma, when a traumatic event doesn’t happen to them directly but they do witness the event. Individuals like caregivers, doctors, counselors, social workers, chaplains, etc. are very susceptible to compassion fatigue because in their line of work caring for individuals who have been traumatized is come place.

In module one, I found Eric Scalise’s lecture on “Managing the High Cost Care” very helpful, particularly when he discussed Compassion Fatigue. Compassion Fatigue, also referred to as secondary or vicarious trauma, is when is when a person has not experienced a traumatic event directly but are around individuals who have so frequently that they, themselves, are impacted emotionally, mentally, spiritually, and/or relationally. Secondary trauma can also happen to those who witness a traumatic event happening to others.

Thematic topic essay Compassion. One word that can explain so many actons. Not just today, but historically. Compassion is very important because it is the reason humans are able to go to heaven. Compassion means to have deep awareness of the suffering of another coupled with the wish to relieve that suffering.

Studies have shown that the development of compassion satisfaction can effectively decrease the occurrences of compassion fatigue and burnout (Collins & Long, 2003). Eastwood & Ecklund (2008) found that compassion satisfaction was negatively correlated with burnout among residential treatment childcare workers. Melamed, Szor, & Bernstein (2001) determined that compassion satisfaction for mental health professionals at outpatient facilities was not only inversely correlated with burnout, but also to feelings of loneliness. Compassion satisfaction was similarly found to decrease the effects of burnout for clinicians working with adolescent sex-offenders (Kraus, 2005). Another study, which examined child welfare workers, showed that compassion satisfaction was correlated with lower reports of burnout and compassion fatigue (Van Hook & Rothenberg, 2009). Overall, compassion satisfaction is a promising idea for nurses to strive for in order to protect against compassion fatigue and burnout.

Self-reflection and correction in social work practice is important for continued learning and professional development. Without self-awareness, social workers cannot separate their personal feelings, values, and attitudes from their professional. This is important because we need to focus on the needs of the client, not what we think they need. Knowing how to separate our personal feelings and values from our professional feelings and values will prevent us from getting burnout and help us maintain professional boundaries.

After all the hard work and challenges I may face academically, I’ve learned that I may also face emotional challenges once I have my foot stepped into the career. Although I believe I have an emotionally strong personality, this career as a social worker still can be stressful. As my responsibility to make decisions about the welfare of the children and families, I may be faced with difficult situations such as not being able to help everyone in the way I hope. Some of my clients or cases may be stuck because of obstacles created by