Introducing the Journal of Compassionate Health Care
- PDF / 238,206 Bytes
- 2 Pages / 595.276 x 793.701 pts Page_size
- 78 Downloads / 205 Views
EDITORIAL
Open Access
Introducing the Journal of Compassionate Health Care Sue Shea1,2* and Christos Lionis1 The inspiration for this new open access journal, Journal of Compassionate Health Care emerged from the apparent need to restore humanity to healthcare, particularly within a period of austerity that has been affecting many countries. In 2011, we organized a successful Symposium on the topic of compassion in health care [1] at the University of Greenwich, UK, bringing together key people from various backgrounds with an interest in moving forward with the science and art of compassion. From this Symposium, we realized that people are united in the importance of developing compassionate health care settings, through a multidisciplinary approach. This editorial seeks to enhance the broad concept of compassionate health care, in theory and in practice by inviting practitioners and researchers in health care to consider compassionate care as a core subject in their interest and research priorities. The journal aims to provide a vehicle for bringing together multidisciplinary perspectives, research and initiatives concerning the concept of compassionate health care, which has recently received much attention and interest. Here we explain the motivation behind the new open access journal, and we invite health care practitioners and researchers to join us in promoting the Journal’s aims and scope.
Compassion in health care Concerns that health care often fails at a fundamental level have been recently escalated in the UK since the publication of the Francis Report [2], which drew international attention to the lack of the most basic elements of care. In the US health care systems, similar problems have also been reported including “escalating costs, medical errors, inconsistent results and, according to a new national survey, a lack of compassion” [3]. Evidence suggests that the component parts of compassion such as kindness, empathy, attention to basic needs, and attention to dignity, * Correspondence: [email protected] 1 Clinic of Social and Family Medicine, Department of Social Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Crete, P.O. Box 2208, 71003 Heraklion, Crete 2 Research Consultant, Whitstable, UK
are crucial in alleviating pain, prompting fast recovery from acute illness, assisting in the management of chronic illness, and relieving anxiety. Other physiological benefits of compassion have also been reported, for example alteration in heart rhythm and brain function in both the person providing and the person receiving compassion [4-6]. For compassion to succeed it is important to consider the health care setting as a whole, including organizational factors. Team work, Health Care Professional (HCP) self care and understanding, and a compassionate approach between HCPs towards each other may all contribute to the overall patient and HCP experience. HCPs are often under strain from large amounts of paperwork and other factors, and burn-out is a growing issue in general practitioners [7]. Thus if HCPs d
Data Loading...
