Abstract
ABSTRACT Objective: to verify the relationship between professional quality of life scores and coping strategies in the multidisciplinary health team that assists children and adolescents victims of sexual violence. Method: a cross-sectional study carried out in a public hospital of Porto Alegre, Brazil. Data collection took place from July to October 2018, using the Professional Quality of Life Scale and the Inventory of Coping Responses at Work. The analysis was performed using the Kruskal-Wallis test and Pearson's Correlation Coefficient. Regression was used for independent variables with p ≤ 0.05 in the bivariate analyses. Results: the professionals showed a medium level in the compassion satisfaction dimension (54.2%), medium level for secondary traumatic stress (50.8%), and medium level for Burnout (61%). Regarding the coping strategies, the decision-making strategy showed a weak correlation with the compassion satisfaction dimension (0.261), and the emotional extravasation strategy showed a moderate correlation with secondary traumatic stress (0.485) and Burnout (0.399). The female gender was associated with secondary traumatic stress (p=0.002). Conclusion: the identification of coping strategies such as decision-making can help the professionals to increase the levels of compassion satisfaction. In situations of suffering in daily work, management to avoid emotional extravasation should take place, preventing high levels of compassion fatigue. Such information is important to support public policies on occupational health, as well as programs to promote occupational health.
Highlights
Health professionals who deal with the suffering and pain of their patients can be exposed to indirect psychological trauma, resulting from the relationship of empathy and compassion established in the therapeutic contact, which may interfere with performance and professional well-being
This study aims to verify the relationship between the professional quality of life scores and coping strategies
According to the multivariate model (Table 4), age was associated with compassion satisfaction and, for each additional year of life, the probability of decreasing satisfaction is 3% (PR=0.97; 95% CI [0.30; 1.60]; p=0.033)
Summary
Health professionals who deal with the suffering and pain of their patients can be exposed to indirect psychological trauma, resulting from the relationship of empathy and compassion established in the therapeutic contact, which may interfere with performance and professional well-being. It is possible to maintain a balance between positive and negative feelings related to work. This balance is called Professional Quality of Life (PQoL).[1]. PQoL incorporates two aspects: compassion satisfaction (positive feelings) and compassion fatigue (negative feelings).[1,2,3] Compassion satisfaction is characterized by feelings of well-being and pleasure obtained through work.[1] It is the satisfaction people feel when helping others who have experienced a traumatic event and the ability to contribute to a healthy work environment, or even to society. Compassion fatigue results from prolonged exposure to compassion stress and is divided into two dimensions: burnout and secondary traumatic stress.[1,4] A number of studies suggest that compassion fatigue is the main threat to the mental health of health professionals.[4,5]
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