Article
How well do medical students express empathy?
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Authors
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Sun Kim
- The Catholic University of Korea, Dept. of Medical Education Medical College Seoul, Korea, South
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Yera Hur
- The Catholic University of Korea, Dept. of Medical Education Medical College Seoul, Korea, South
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A Ra Cho
- The Catholic University of Korea, Dept. of Medical Education Medical College Seoul, Korea, South
| Published: | August 31, 2015 |
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Outline
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Objecive: Empathy is an important trait of a physician and a key element in the physician-patient relationship. This study explored three overarching topics:
- What are the ability to express empathy scores in medical students?
- Are there difference in the ability to express empathy by gender?
- Are there difference in the ability to express empathy by academic year?
Methods: Medical student empathy was measured by the modified Pencil-and-Paper Empathy Rating Test of Winefield & Chur-Hansen (2001). Medical students took about 15 minutes to complete the scale, and it was then scored by one of two trained evaluators (coding rules=0 to 4-point scale, total score=40). The subjects comprised 373 medical students. The data were analyzed by descriptive analysis, t-test, and one-way ANOVA using SPSS version 21.0 (IBM Corp.).
Results: Empathy rating test scores were low-level in medical students (min=7, max=23, mean=11.93, SD=2.36). The most common response to items in the empathy scale on test occasions (averaging 79.8% of all responses) was ‘non-empathetic'. Differences were observed in the level of ability to express empathy between genders (male students > female students, t=-4.562, p=0.001) and academic year (4th year students > other years, F=6.680, p=0.001).
Discussion/conclusion: Even if they recognize the importance of empathy but cannot express it with words or deeds, they cannot be regarded to have sufficient capabilities for that. Though the students’ skills to express empathy did differ slightly by academic year and gender, most of them were found to be “non-empathetic” (coded 1, and usually direct advice or reassurance or closed question). Our results suggest that practical training in expressing empathy should be included in medical education and that an empathy training program must be focused on changes in behavior.
