Combating Compassion Fatigue

Combating Compassion Fatigue
Name
Course number
Instructor’s name
Date
Caring professionals such as first responders and those involved in continual care engross themselves in tragedies of those in need of care and often suffer from compassion fatigue. They offer timely and comprehensive response to the patient in life threatening conditions. These situations drain their cognitive and emotional resources and they often require emotional counsel and therapeutic interventions for their emotional replenishment. The feelings of emptiness result in the caregivers’ inability to provide compassion which occurs in a gradual process. The eventual effect is that the caregivers become unwilling to effective care which compromises quality of care (Huster & Ansley, 2010).
One of the surest signs indicating a caregivers’ compassion fatigue is when they display apathy. This occurs when the caregivers exhaust their emotional resource which is characterized by a lack of concern. The other warning sign of compassion fatigue is evident when a caregiver no longer derives pleasure from work. It is characterized by lateness and absenteeism. Perpetuated physical fatigue is another warning sign of fatigue which manifests in terms of being tired and exhausted. The caregivers may experience back pains, headaches, lack of sleep, restlessness and stomach upsets among other physical symptoms that may result in one taking sick leave (Coetzee & Klopper, 2010).
Caregivers also suffer from overwhelming feelings of hopelessness and sadness. These feelings may later graduate to depression symptoms such as insomnia, a sense of worthlessness and inadequacy which signal low self-esteem. Being hostile to others is also another warning sign that a caregiver may be suffering from compassion fatigue. It is also common to witness caregivers withdrawing from others and preferring isolation they also become increasingly antagonistic and this disrupts harmony that is required to work as part of a team. They are constantly blaming others, blowing simple issues out of proportion and are paranoid (Jo, 2009).
Compassion fatigue is distinguished from burnout in the sense that it stems from emotional drain resulting from witnessing traumatic situations in the work place while burnout stems from issues surrounding the work setting. Compassion fatigue arises when the caregivers are unable to meet their goals for rescue those needing care and it results into stressful feelings of guilt. When a caregiver is unsuccessful, it results in guilt for failing to accomplish the expectations created through the relational and interpersonal connections with the patients and the patient’s family. The caregiver’s internal emotional resources are depleted as the caregiver attempts to give more with little or no positive outcomes which eventually creates a feeling of emptiness (Boyle, 2011).
Compassion fatigue may also result from work pressures and the unavailability of educational resources that develop caregivers’ technological competence coupled with the need for new skills to handle more complex work demands. Caregivers may also feel unappreciated for the hard work they endure amidst limited resources. These issues are also aggravated by problems and external pressures such as family where one may display a distant attitude and irritability. This may even be evidenced by withdrawing from physical exercise routines, having nightmares about patients and other loved ones, poor performance in studies, perpetual fear and feelings of inadequacy at work (Jo, 2009).
Compassionate fatigue arises from the cumulative grief, loss and sadness which emanates from agonizing over a patients’ pain. Caregivers with the disorder experience stress, guilt reduced empathy (Mayer, 2012). They refrain from forming interpersonal relationships with patients through avoidance. This compromises care because they are unable to effectively understand the patient’s needs and it also negatively affects early detection of problems which may subsequently result in error prone substandard care.
Caregivers require preparing their physical bodies, their souls, their thought processes, and their spirit for resiliency. This is because they require working with the patients at optimal interpersonal levels with patients. Caregivers require developing empathy which draws upon self-efficacy and positive beliefs about their patients. It is strongly related to a caregiver’s ability to listen and exercise cultural competence in addressing patient’s needs. Spiritually, caregivers require connecting with their inner self through prayer, meditation, and internal reflection among other strategies. This comforts, replenishes and develops their inner awareness and which is important in developing their ability to attend to the patients’ emotional needs which are a product of their inner lives. They also require learning how to manage feelings of sadness, maintain vulnerab...