Parting Thoughts: A Systemic Paradigm of Empathy in Patient Care and Future Directions

Abstract

Empathy in health professions education and patient care is viewed from a broader and more comprehensive perspective of systems theory. In a systemic paradigm of empathy in patient care, the contributions of major subsets of the system (e.g., clinician-related, nonclinician-related, social learning, and education) and their related elements to clinical encounters that lead to functional or dysfunctional system outcomes are discussed. An agenda for future research is outlined which includes: (1) exploration of additional components of empathy in the context of health professions education and patient care; (2) the investigation of additional variables that are beneficial or detrimental to empathy in patient care; (3) consideration of empathy as a criterion for admissions, selection, and employment; (4) the study of empathy as a predictor of career choice, academic and professional success; (5) the development and evaluation of approaches to enhance and sustain empathy in health professions education and patient care; (6) development of approaches to maximize empathy and regulate sympathy; (7) the development of national norm tables and cutoff scores to identify JSE high and low scorers; (8) consideration of patients’ and peers’ perspectives in outcomes of empathy research; and (9) further explorations of neurological underpinnings of empathy. It is suggested that implementation of remedies for enhancing and sustaining empathy is a mandate that must be acted upon, not only by academic medical centers but by all other educational institutions.