Compassion Fatigue among Mental Health Nurses: Prevention and Mitigation Strategies

Running head: COMPASSION FATIGUE
Compassion fatigue
Name of the Student
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Author note

1COMPASSION FATIGUE
The true prevalence of compassion fatigue (CF) among mental health nurses remains
open for discussion. Working with mental health patients is full of stressful situations and a
growing literature is suggesting burnout among mental health nurses. CF is defined as a state of
psychological or physical stress condition among nurses or caregivers that occurs due to
consequences of snowballing and ongoing process in demanding relationship with mental health
patients (Mendes 2014). This condition is also defined as ‘helper syndrome’ resulting from
disappointing situations that give rise to loss of compassion and moral distress. CF is defined to
result from deep involvement with mentally ill patients leading to suffering during caring for
them (van Mol et al. 2015). Complex demands made from mental health nurses while caring for
dementia patients place extraordinary stress making them feel overburdened in their profession.
This has serious implications as inability to deliver proper care for patients leading to
compassion and increased number of nurse turnover (Kelly, Runge and Spencer 2015).
Therefore, the above discussion highlights that CF is reaching an alarming stage and require
implementation of strategies for prevention, identification and mitigation of CF among mental
health nurses. Taking this into consideration, the following paper will discuss and contribute to
the understanding of CF among mental health nurses and ways to prevent it. Moreover, the paper
will also discuss best evidence based literature available on the chosen topic. The rationale for
choosing this topic is that nurses are the largest and single member of healthcare providers who
are at the frontlines of care delivery. In addition, mental health nurses provide care for serious
mentally ill patients having complex needs. Therefore, to reduce burnout and ensure quality of
care in mental health nursing, there is urgent need for CF mitigation to provide best quality of
received care.

2COMPASSION FATIGUE
Mental health nurses forms a crucial part of psychiatric workforce-mental health
speciality and their role in caring for dementia patients is exhausting both mentally and
physically. Caring for dementia patients is extremely stressful as patients lack the ability to
communicate and this result in difficulty to manage patients that give rise to work-related stress
among mental health nurses. CF not only impact mental health nurses in psychiatric speciality
due to caring for dementia patients, but also due to pain experiences of patients suffering from
dementia (Franza, Del Buono and Pellegrino 2015). Figley explained that CF is experienced by
individuals who see others in pain and distress (Sheppard 2015). Similarly, when mental health
nurses view their patients suffering from dementia experiencing pain, they get traumatized via
their efforts to show empathy and compassion. This is the reason CF is designated as secondary
traumatic stress that results from caring for dementia patients suffering from emotional and
physical stress or pain (Hinderer et al. 2014). Another triggering factor for CF among nurses is
work environment (Hunsaker et al. 2015). Due to shortage of mental health nurses, workload
and poor support make them helpless and they are unable to escape situation giving rise to
workplace-related stress and CF. Intense involvement of mental health nurses with dementia
patients gives rise to CF or psychological stress and impairment of provision of care given to
them leading to poor care delivery and management.
As suggested in literature, one of the main effects of dementia is losing control and
behavioural changes that are sudden and challenging for mental health nurses to manage
(Mitchell et al. 2014). Moreover, there are challenges to hydration, adequate nutrition, sleep
patterns and difficulties with motivation demanding high amount of care from mental health
nurses leave them devastated and stressed being a significant factor hampering patient safety. To
adhere to these demands of dementia care, mental health nurses face state of exhaustion with

3COMPASSION FATIGUE
losing coping ability. Various triggering factors are witnessed in CF that includes physical,
work-related and emotional symptoms. There is less empathy towards them and avoidance of
working with dementia patients, restlessness, mood swings, irritability, anxiety, poor judgment,
depression and loss of objectivity (Sheppard 2015). These consequences give rise to CF
including hyper-vigilance, sleep disturbance, anxiety, fear, physical sensations like feeling
burdened, difficulty in concentrating, overwhelmed with feelings of hopelessness and isolation
resulting in disengagement and disconnectedness (Hegney et al. 2014). These conditions not only
affect nurses in terms of physical or emotional health, but also their job satisfaction and
workplace environment decreasing organizational productivity and increasing nursing turnover.
Various theoretical perspectives are related to CF. Watson theory of human caring states
that empathy and communication advocates for empathetic relationship-based nursing that is
defined to understand feelings and situations from patient’s perspective and communicating
accordingly to gain understanding of patient’s condition (Yeter Durgun Ozan 2015). Another
perceptive put forward by Koloroutis is that healthy relationship with patients can only be
advocated, if nurse’s relationship with self is established (Fitzpatrick 2014). However, due to CF
there are imbalances in personal relationship and work-life that becomes a significant factor in
CP. Physical and emotional factors triggering CF is hampering their relationship with self and in
optimizing their health resulting in failure to provide compassionate care and being a productive
member of mental health workforce (Drury et al. 2014). The emotional investment that mental
health nurses invest is overextended that challenge their ability to manage demands of being
empathetic and compassionate towards patients with dementia (Sorenson et al. 2016). This is a
serious issue impacting adversely and directly on the nurses’ psychological, psychical and
emotional health. Although, professional nursing thrives to provide care and develop empathetic