gms | German Medical Science

Empathy in physician-patient-relationships is doubtlessly a hot topic in current international research. Thus, self-rating scales like the Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy for Students (JSPE-S) are developed and often translated and adapted to different languages (e.g. for Japanese [1], Korean [2], Iranian [3], and Polish [4] samples). Recently, a German version of the JSPE-S was developed at the Medical University of Vienna (n=516 2^nd year medical students) [5]. Study results on equivalence of psychometric properties of these international versions in regard to the US- version are satisfying. However, significant differences in the mean total scores are obvious. To illustrate these differences, we used t-tests on the mean total scores of the German JSPE-S version and the other versions (including the original). The differences between Austrian medical students’ and international students’attitude towards physician empathy (with little to moderate effect sizes) are interpreted in the light of variation regarding cultural aspects, drawn sample and local specifics of medical curricula.

Take home message: In international research (on attitude towards empathy) it is not sufficient just to report scores and differences, but rather to highlight cultural and educational variables that might affect the scores.