Empathy amongst doctors: an observational study

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Psychology
• Healthcare Research

Background:

• Empathy is crucial for effective patient care.
• Diminished empathy can arise from lack of experience or routine practice.
• Understanding empathy levels in physicians is vital for improving healthcare quality.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess empathy levels among doctors in Malaysia.
• To investigate factors influencing empathy, including practice setting, age, gender, academic status, and medical discipline.
• To identify potential areas for enhancing physician empathy.

Main Methods:

• A cross-sectional, observational study was conducted in Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia.
• Convenience sampling was used to recruit 127 doctors from private, public hospitals, and a medical university.
• The Toronto Empathy Questionnaire (TEQ) was employed to measure empathy.

Main Results:

• No significant difference in empathy was found between male and female doctors.
• Empathy did not correlate with age.
• Medical-based doctors exhibited higher empathy than surgical-based doctors (p=0.002).
• Specialized doctors and university faculty showed greater empathy than their non-specialized or hospital-based counterparts (p=0.004).

Conclusions:

• Clinical experience and specialization appear to enhance physician empathy.
• University-based doctors demonstrated higher empathy than hospital-based doctors.
• Integrating empathy-focused training into medical curricula may improve empathy across different doctor demographics and practice levels.
• Further research with larger, diverse populations and culturally validated tools is recommended.