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Qualitative interviews explored self-compassion’s effects on burnout in rehabilitation healthcare providers, suggesting valuable insights for patient care.
BACKGROUND Rehabilitation healthcare providers (HCPs) report high levels of burnout. Self-compassion interventions have shown beneficial effects on burnout in other areas of healthcare, but never assessed in specialist rehabilitation settings where challenges may differ. OBJECTIVE To explore the experiences of specialist rehabilitation HCPs with an online Self-Compassion for Healthcare Communities (SCHC) course aimed at addressing burnout. METHODS Qualitative interviews (N = 20) were used to explore course experiences and an inductive thematic approach undertaken to analyze data and organize findings. RESULTS Six themes that reflected HCPs’ experiences with the course arose: (1) the nature of working in rehabilitation, (2) different perspectives on burnout in specialist rehabilitation, (3) a new perspective – less self-criticism, more self-compassion, (4) growing recognition of the importance of compassion for oneself and others, (5) challenges engaging with the SCHC course, and (6) challenges to sustaining self-compassion in specialist rehabilitation. CONCLUSIONS Specialist rehabilitation HCPs who participated in the SCHC course developed a new understanding of the importance of fostering self-compassion and compassion for others. This shift supported HCPs in navigating the challenges of their work while also reducing personal burnout and enhancing patient care and relationships with colleagues. CLINICALTRIAL The intervention was registered as a clinical trial (Identification Number: NCT05997082).
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Cohen et al. (2025) studied this question.
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