Benchmark Assignment: Application of Concept Analysis to Clinical Practice

Compassion Fatigue
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Outline
Compassion fatigue…..3
Article summary………4
Method of analysis……5
Application …………..6
Conclusion …………..7
References …………...8
Compassion Fatigue
Compassion fatigue is a phrase that has become quite common in the nursing profession and in the scholarly circles. Studies indicate that care givers are prone to traumatic experiences as a result of the need to give empathy and offer care to patients, especially where the needs of the system and the demands from the patients keep on rising with the dynamic nature of the health care systems. Managed care has been cited as one of the causes of compassion fatigue among most nurses in the united states relative to the fact that, the care givers are given less time and more patients to look after, while the demands of these patients also keep on rising relative to the policy changes within the health care field (Coetzee & Klopper, 2010). Previous mentions of the concept were tied to the term burnout, which simply meant that the care givers were experiencing deep dissatisfaction on the job and no longer felt compassionate about helping their patients. According to an article by Coetzee and Klopper, the term is now in reference to a concept that largely relates to secondary traumatic stress disorder (Coetzee & Klopper, 2010).
Care givers work in a highly stressful environment commonly characterized by high performance pressure, traumatic events, emotional challenges, social challenges, insatiable needs of the patients and the mounting pressure from the health care policies. All the negative pressure is bound to take effect on the care givers regardless of the fact that they are working fulltime or part timers through volunteering. The effects are characterized by a care giver that does not have the personal drive to care for patients and is affected at the social levels as well as the professional levels. The article by Coetzee and Klopper Compassion fatigue within nursing practice: A concept analysis, is a concept review of the underlying elements of the phrase and the implications in health care system delivery as well as the nursing practice (Coetzee & Klopper, 2010).
Article Summary
Coetzee and Klopper in their article try to bring out the basic elements of the concept that is compassion fatigue, with close reference to the nursing practice (Coetzee & Klopper, 2010). Nurses are constantly exposed to traumatic situations where they are supposed to care for patient going through trauma, pain, suffering, sickness, weaknesses, desperation and wounds. At the same time they are supposed to contend with the challenges that come with increased workloads, nurses shortages, poor management support, poor working conditions, poor remuneration rates, limited career opportunities, unstable working environments, lack of proper of education and limited resources among others. According to the article this is a lot of pressure for someone that is supposed to show compassion at all times to patients that take care of (Coetzee & Klopper, 2010). At one point, the nurses are bound to bend to the pressure placed on them by the systems and the basic experiences that they have on a daily bases at their work place. The article mentions the fact that the concept of compassion fatigue was first introduced in the year 1992, under the name burnout, relating to the reduced ability to nurture.
To evaluate the concept of compassion fatigue, Coetzee and Klopper use the Walker and Avant method as the guiding framework to establish the underlying elements of the concept, that would better help the readers and scholars better understand the entire concept and its implication within the nursing practice (Coetzee & Klopper, 2010). The findings indicate the need of addressing compassion fatigue with the nursing profession relative to the fact that once the nurses have experienced this level of dissatisfaction with their job and have developed an uncompassionate attitude; it is relatively hard for them to recover. Given that nursing requires the staffs to be compassionate about he...