Relationship of burnout with empathy dimensions in healthcare workers in Poland during the COVID-19 pandemic

Burnout and empathy are distinct but related constructs essential to effective healthcare delivery. Although their relationship is widely acknowledged, existing research shows inconclusive findings regarding the direction and the nature of this association. The predominant evidence supports a negative correlation, but studies usually did not take into account that the empathy construct is multidimensional. Little is known about the interplay of empathy and burnout dimensions in healthcare workers (HCWs), especially during the COVID-19 pandemic times. The present study was intended to fill the above-mentioned gaps. A total of 412 HCWs (nurses - 47.3%, physicians - 28.4%, psychologists - 13.6%, and other health care professionals - 10.7%), aged 21 to 69 years (M = 36.63, SD = 11.76) took part in a web-based cross-sectional study from June to November 2020. The participants filled out a survey with measures assessing two dimensions of burnout (exhaustion and disengagement), three dimensions of empathy (empathic concern - EC, personal distress - PD and perspective taking - PT), depression and anxiety symptoms. We found a negative association between the disengagement dimension of burnout with EC and PT and a positive association with PD, whereas exhaustion was positively related to EC and PD. Hierarchical regression analysis, however, revealed that EC, PT, and PD are predictors of disengagement, whereas exhaustion is predicted exclusively by PD. We also found no evidence that working in a place dedicated to COVID-19 moderated the relationships between dimensions of empathy and burnout. Previous studies suggested a negative relationship between empathy and burnout. We found, however, evidence for both positive and negative correlations between different aspects of the empathy and burnout dimensions, with positive associations of personal distress with burnout being stronger than negative associations of PT and EC with disengagement, suggesting that the relationship between empathy and burnout is more complex.