What Is Serving, Leading And Leading In Health Care

As a Radiologic Technologist you are faced with many difficult situations in and out of the work environment. Providing care for patients and families when necessary is part of your daily duties and these may affect you. Feelings and emotions are a very important aspect while working in this environment, and controlling and understanding these emotions are a very important part of the job. Emotions affect patients, their families, and even us as Radiologic Technologist and controlling these emotions will provide a better experience for our patients, families and ultimately us. Patients endure many ups and downs while in the hospital and are affected by many different situations. As a Radiologic Technologist we are encouraged to communicate and relive some of the frightening and unknown questions of each patient as well as their families. There are also many theories behind a person’s emotional intelligence and why this affects our jobs as Radiologic Technologists. Ultimately how we let working in the health field affect us in and outside of the work environment will determine our future in our careers. Everyday you will have the opportunity to wake up and face a very emotional and uncertain task, and how you choose to handle these situations will impact your life and work ethic.

Compassion is one of the fundamental characteristics implemented into patient care by health care providers. Compassion signifies “a feeling of deep sympathy and sorrow for another who is stricken by misfortune, accompanied by a strong desire to alleviate the suffering” (Compassion, n.d.). Nurses and other health care providers provide selfless service, tireless dedication, compassion, and often neglect their personal needs, which

The purpose of this essay is to look at barriers of compassion and what nurses could do overcome these barriers. Three sub topics will be looked at over the course of this essay and a conclusion will be made to evaluate these essays findings and to provide some input into battling these barriers so that patients can receive high standards of patient care.

Health caregivers are the group of people mostly at risk of developing compassion fatigue. Most of the times, compassion fatigue may be as a result of the situations the care providers encountered and the pain they feel for their patients. One of the vital element of healthcare is providing a compassionate care. Compassion is defined as being aware of other people suffering, and desire to help to them reduce the suffering (Ruysschaert, 2009). Compassion fatigue is seen as a form of burnout that affect the health care provider which manifest itself as physical, emotional, and spiritual exhaustion (Lynch & Lobo, 2012). The four major factors that can lead to compassion fatigue are, giving others too much caring and not enough care to self, unresolved past trauma, inability to control stress at work, and lack of satisfaction in the work (Ruysschaert, 2009). Compassion fatigue occurs when the caregivers are milked of their sense of wellbeing, comfort, their purpose in life, strength and all the good qualities they have. It is important for those that caring for others to also pay attention to their own needs. Taking care of your own needs means that you will be healthy and therefore be more able to care for others. The caregiver needs to be able to recognize and discuss compassion in order to avoid it.

American Nurses Association (APA) has advocated in Improving patient outcome and the quality of healthcare provided to patients through the implication of healthcare reforms (Middleton, 2011). Post (2011) states that “A key first element of healthcare reform must be a return to compassion.” Using compassion in healthcare brings satisfaction to the patients and families which consequently creates a trusting bond between the caregiver and patient. Compassion is appreciating diversity and conducting work in a competent professional manner tailored to the patient's needs (Middleton, 2011). In healthcare, compassion goes beyond being nice, it creates awareness of the patient’s state and allows clinicians to communicate more openly with clients giving the patients a better understanding of their treatment. Nevertheless, patients are looking for more than a nurse who is “nice”, they are looking for a professional who is knowledgeable in their field and technically competent.

According to Burkhartd (), “compassion is the ability to imagine oneself in the situation of another” (p.50). Majority of the population has experienced a form of illness or another at some point in life. Previous encounters with particular situations help people to understand exactly what someone is going through. A nurse may come across a patient who is suffering from the same type of cancer that his/her grandfather once did or a child who fractured the same bone he/she did during childhood. Previous experiences don’t have to be lived to fully understand each situation, sometimes repetitious occurrences help. For example, the nurse could also understand a particular circumstance because he/she cared for many others who suffered from the same illness. It helps the nurse remember what if this were my grandfather, who was in the exact situation? What helped the most when that happened to me? These prior experiences bring about feelings of compassion and motivation to care for this patient with the best of his/her abilities. The essential nursing value of altruism also motivates people to help those in need. As a healthcare provider, it’s important to have faith in the human race and have a sincere concern for human beings. Without the concern for mankind there would be no desire to help those in

The concept of followership is crucial to the leadership process today. In the past, followers were not viewed as important whatsoever. They were viewed as puppets that had no potential to make a change. In the new paradigm, followers are just as important as leaders. There are several behavioral styles of followers: alienated, conformist, pragmatists, passive, and effective.

Compassion represents an “acknowledgement of another’s suffering and is accompanied by the expression of a desire to ease or end that suffering.” (Van der Cingal, 2009, p. 124) This is a fundamental characteristic usually found in health care workers and nurses especially. In one twelve hour shift, a nurse’s job can change from taking vitals and administering medications to performing life saving measures

Compassionate healthcare organizations reliably enable the attributes, abilities, behaviors and skills of compassionate individuals to flourish. The value and importance of compassion and compassionate care are embedded in the cultures of such organizations, modeled by their clinical and administrative leaders, and expressed in their policies, processes and governance. The overarching commitment is that individuals and the organizations, institutions and systems in which they work, must value compassionate care sufficiently to use it as a lens to sharpen their focus on providing high quality and humanistic care. The aim of the commitments that follow is to ensure that all clinicians and other care providers are able to

The results were clearly related to the introduction and the authors found support for their hypothesis that compassion training would benefit health care workers. However, the study did have numerous shortcomings. The study sample was extremely small, and the participants worked in the same location and area of the hospital. This raises the question of if the results would be the same with a larger sample or in a different area of the country. An additional option for further research is to examine if the training would receive similar results in another area of the hospital, for example with employees in NICU. The study was also performed in a relatively short timeline with the follow-up being completed 9 months after training. How long will the impacts continue, and what on-going methods are necessary to continue battling compassion fatigue? Although the authors acknowledge that further exploration is necessary, they do not address any of these questions. In spite of these shortcomings, it was overall a strong paper and after further research the training referenced may be utilized to assist caregivers with compassion

It is estimated that at least 33% of nurses have suffered from burn out at some time. Those particularly at risk for this form of secondary traumatic stress, are nurses who work in environments where patients’ health conditions do not typically improve. These can include fields such as death and dying and oncology. Despite this it is important to realize that no nurse is immune to compassion fatigue. This paper will seek to discuss why compassion is necessary in nursing care, as well as the manifestations, causes, development, effects, and solutions to compassion fatigue. As mentioned previously, compassionate care is a significant part of nursing practice. To understand how compassionate care can affect patients this paper will discuss two clinical examples. In The article Why Compassion Counts Peter Frost documents how he observed compassion during hospitalization. Mr. Frost was in a unit recovering from surgery related to cancer. In the room with him “ was a man in his early 70s who had his esophagus and stomach removed”. This gentleman was incontinent and one day on his way to use the restroom he had a bowel movement in the middle of the

I have chosen this topic to research because it is the field I am wanting to pursue. I have a need to help people so going for a career in the medical field is perfect for me. “No matter what specific imaging technology a radiologic technologist works with, a sharp eye for detail, the ability to follow detailed instructions and a passion for helping people is very important for success,” states one career website in regards to work environment (RadiologyED.org).

Who wouldn’t like to receive good care? Compassion can have different meanings and can be viewed differently by different individuals but one of the meanings would be shown by treating others how you would want yourself to be treated and cared for. (Chambers & Ryder, 2009, p. 2) Adding to the previously, compassionate care is also acknowledge as not only being a command or aspect of nurses is more defined by the actions that outcome when the bond with the patient is created. (Bournell, 2009, pp. 319,320)

As the leading people in hospitals, nurses should be required to perceive compassion to patients. Compassion is the concern for others sufferings and misfortunes. It is the nurses’ responsibility to give patients quality care at all times. Back in 1907, institutions were created for the purpose of caring for the sick which gives the responsibility of nurses to provide the care that they promise. Hospitals are places of cleanliness, safety, and healing. This study will discuss patient satisfaction and dissatisfaction, restoring compassion in the practice and training of nursing, and how nursing should not just be a “job”. In addition to this, an article by Joan E. Lynaugh from University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing discusses the background and modern day study on nurses, institutions, and caring. “Still, as the papers in this section show, nurses remain tightly linked with institutions, since often that is where the patients they care for are to be found. And, the issues remain much the same as they were when nursing was invented: how much care can be given when people cannot care for themselves; how should that care be paid for; how will the work of care be divided; where will the caregivers come from; and, how much knowledge and skill should caregivers have?” Furthermore, this goes in depth about the concerns in the nursing field today. Compassion is central in nursing and making it a requirement is important when it comes to training.

This publication was issued by Department Of Health in the year of 2012. The title “Compassion in Practice” clearly gives the