Compassionate Leadership in Healthcare: A Concept Analysis Using the Walker and Avant Method

Compassionate leadership is an emerging approach in healthcare management that integrates compassion with leadership to support healthcare professionals and improve the quality of care. However, its conceptual boundaries and defining characteristics remain insufficiently established, limiting its consistent application and empirical evaluation. This study aimed to clarify the concept of compassionate leadership among healthcare providers using the Walker and Avant concept analysis method and to provide a conceptual foundation for its application in healthcare leadership, education, and practice. A systematic literature search was conducted across PubMed, Scopus, PsycINFO, CINAHL, SID, and IranDoc, from database inception to August 2026, using terms related to "compassionate leadership", "compassion", "leadership", and "healthcare providers". The study selection process followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, and 19 relevant studies were included. Compassionate leadership emerged as a multidimensional construct encompassing three interconnected domains of defining attributes: ethical and value-based, emotional and interpersonal, and organizational and developmental. Its antecedents included personal and leadership characteristics, communication behaviors, organizational support, and training and development, while its consequences extended to healthcare professionals' well-being, quality of care, organizational culture and performance, and personal and professional development. Based on these findings, compassionate leadership was defined as a leadership approach characterized by empathy, understanding, presence, and support for both patients and healthcare staff, fostering compassionate relationships, modeling compassionate behaviors, and promoting a supportive organizational culture. This concept analysis provides a clearer conceptual definition and preliminary theoretical framework for compassionate leadership in healthcare. By delineating its core attributes, antecedents, and consequences, the findings establish a foundation for distinguishing compassionate leadership from related leadership approaches and for guiding future theory development, empirical testing, and development and validation of contextually appropriate measurement instruments.