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Compassion Fatigue and Burnout in Nursing: Enhancing Professional Quality of Life
"[T]his is an exceptional book and worth the investment for both the novice nurse who wants to proactively recognize compassion fatigue and for the experienced nurse who is struggling with professional quality of life."-- Journal for Nurses in Professional Development
"An excellent resource for all levels of nurses...Highly recommended."-- Current Reviews for Academic Libraries
"The book is a powerful expression of the needs of all nurses, whatever their practice setting, with an easily applied method of reaching out to our co-workers and other healthcare professionals to improve our own lives, and, ultimately, the welfare of our patients."-- ANA-Maine Journal, The Newsletter of the American Nurses Association--Maine
"This book provides insight and solutions to [compassion fatigue and burnout] and can save numerous nurses from leaving a loved and valued profession."-- Advance For Nurses
"Todaro-Franceschi has done a great service not only for nurses, but for all professional health care providers who will find this book helpful in sustaining compassion satisfaction while avoiding fatigue and, hopefully, preventing burnout."-- The Forum
"This book is a good resource for nurses interested in helping themselves or others maintain a connection with the purpose of their work."-- Critical Care Nurse
Compassion fatigue afflicts nurses working in all caring environments and has become a serious issue in health care institutions nationwide. This is the only book to specifically address this challenge and the related syndrome of burnout in nursing. It presents a unique healing model designed to identify, treat and, where possible, avert compassion fatigue with holistic strategies and action plans that help cultivate a healthier, more satisfying work environment.
The volume addresses risk factors for and manifestations of compassion fatigue, burnout, and other related experiences such as PTS, death overload, collective trauma, and moral distress, and presents strategies to mediate and resolve these issues. The author emphasizes ways in which dissatisfaction influences the quality of patient care and calls for nurses to reinvent their work environments to favor compassion contentment. Case vignettes and exercises will help readers identify and alter patterns of negativity to reaffirm purpose in their professional lives.
Key
"An excellent resource for all levels of nurses...Highly recommended."-- Current Reviews for Academic Libraries
"The book is a powerful expression of the needs of all nurses, whatever their practice setting, with an easily applied method of reaching out to our co-workers and other healthcare professionals to improve our own lives, and, ultimately, the welfare of our patients."-- ANA-Maine Journal, The Newsletter of the American Nurses Association--Maine
"This book provides insight and solutions to [compassion fatigue and burnout] and can save numerous nurses from leaving a loved and valued profession."-- Advance For Nurses
"Todaro-Franceschi has done a great service not only for nurses, but for all professional health care providers who will find this book helpful in sustaining compassion satisfaction while avoiding fatigue and, hopefully, preventing burnout."-- The Forum
"This book is a good resource for nurses interested in helping themselves or others maintain a connection with the purpose of their work."-- Critical Care Nurse
Compassion fatigue afflicts nurses working in all caring environments and has become a serious issue in health care institutions nationwide. This is the only book to specifically address this challenge and the related syndrome of burnout in nursing. It presents a unique healing model designed to identify, treat and, where possible, avert compassion fatigue with holistic strategies and action plans that help cultivate a healthier, more satisfying work environment.
The volume addresses risk factors for and manifestations of compassion fatigue, burnout, and other related experiences such as PTS, death overload, collective trauma, and moral distress, and presents strategies to mediate and resolve these issues. The author emphasizes ways in which dissatisfaction influences the quality of patient care and calls for nurses to reinvent their work environments to favor compassion contentment. Case vignettes and exercises will help readers identify and alter patterns of negativity to reaffirm purpose in their professional lives.
Key
- GenresNursing
256 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2012
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46 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
May 8, 2026
Amazing. Incredible. Showstopping. Fantastic.
I would recommend this book to ANYONE in healthcare not just nurses and I wish I'd found it as a fresh new grad although it is certainly more meaningful to me now. The book discusses not just compassion fatigue and burnout but end of life care, bullying in nursing, nursing school curriculum and more. In doing so, she articulates many problems in healthcare and familiar situations that almost any nurse would be familiar with. Even if you are not currently suffering from compassion fatigue or burnout it provides practical strategies, promotes reflection, mindfulness and connection to prevent it. It also includes questionnaires to evaluate yourself with, resources to further explore and benefit from.
I really appreciated the chapter regarding care of the dying patient. Since becoming a nurse, especially working in critical care, it's baffling to me that despite death being so prevalent and inevitable it is still treated as taboo by healthcare professionals. I'm so inspired by the author's work in death education and her determination to make it a mandatory topic of study for anyone entering healthcare. It's really given me some ideas as to how I can be a part of that, too.
The book has a spiritual focus about it as well which was fine for me because I am Christian and I do think the way the author thinks. It was not, in my opinion, that cheugy kind (re: evangelical) of spiritual/religious talk that insists on you living by God's word. It's more like "all of us are connected," "be nice to everyone." I only mention all this because I know some people can be turned off by religious stuff especially if there is a superiority complex around it (myself included).
I would recommend this book to ANYONE in healthcare not just nurses and I wish I'd found it as a fresh new grad although it is certainly more meaningful to me now. The book discusses not just compassion fatigue and burnout but end of life care, bullying in nursing, nursing school curriculum and more. In doing so, she articulates many problems in healthcare and familiar situations that almost any nurse would be familiar with. Even if you are not currently suffering from compassion fatigue or burnout it provides practical strategies, promotes reflection, mindfulness and connection to prevent it. It also includes questionnaires to evaluate yourself with, resources to further explore and benefit from.
I really appreciated the chapter regarding care of the dying patient. Since becoming a nurse, especially working in critical care, it's baffling to me that despite death being so prevalent and inevitable it is still treated as taboo by healthcare professionals. I'm so inspired by the author's work in death education and her determination to make it a mandatory topic of study for anyone entering healthcare. It's really given me some ideas as to how I can be a part of that, too.
The book has a spiritual focus about it as well which was fine for me because I am Christian and I do think the way the author thinks. It was not, in my opinion, that cheugy kind (re: evangelical) of spiritual/religious talk that insists on you living by God's word. It's more like "all of us are connected," "be nice to everyone." I only mention all this because I know some people can be turned off by religious stuff especially if there is a superiority complex around it (myself included).
January 8, 2019
This is a fantastic book for anyone in nursing. Our nursing goals have been impeded by poisonous work environments and resource deficits—-among other factors—-that have contributed to compassion fatigue, burnout, and large numbers of nurses leaving nursing. To counter these environmental stressors, Dr. Franceschi-Todaro advises us to turn outward—to value and heal relationships with our own selves, our colleagues, and our patients. By doing so, we can harness the collective energy of positive relationships to surmount obstacles and thrive.
November 23, 2013
This book addresses aspects of nursing that don't get enough attention. A reader of this book may learn to be a better nurse, but gets there by learning to be a better human being overall. I'm currently a nursing student, and we're taught about treating the whole person, not just their disease. This book applies a holistic approach to the profession of nursing. It's "everything else" that nursing school doesn't teach you, in a format that's easy to read and full of meaningful anecdotes.
Dr. Todaro-Franceschi speaks of dealing with compassion fatigue, burnout, patient suffering, death, and traumatic work environments. She offers ways to make positive changes. She speaks of energy, purpose, healthy work environments, and compassion. She applauds every single nurse (burned out or not), and empowers us all to shape our own lives (and consequently, our patients' lives) through positive and progressive choices. These choices revolve around self-awareness, mutual respect and support of ourselves and others, assertiveness, and self-advocacy. Dr. Todaro-Franceschi explains how "everything is one" and connected. When we treat ourselves and others with respect, everyone wins.
This book is enlightening and empowering; and I feel that health care would progress greatly as a profession if more health care workers implemented the ideals taught in this book. I look forward to re-reading portions of this book with a new perspective as I work as a nurse after graduation.
Dr. Todaro-Franceschi speaks of dealing with compassion fatigue, burnout, patient suffering, death, and traumatic work environments. She offers ways to make positive changes. She speaks of energy, purpose, healthy work environments, and compassion. She applauds every single nurse (burned out or not), and empowers us all to shape our own lives (and consequently, our patients' lives) through positive and progressive choices. These choices revolve around self-awareness, mutual respect and support of ourselves and others, assertiveness, and self-advocacy. Dr. Todaro-Franceschi explains how "everything is one" and connected. When we treat ourselves and others with respect, everyone wins.
This book is enlightening and empowering; and I feel that health care would progress greatly as a profession if more health care workers implemented the ideals taught in this book. I look forward to re-reading portions of this book with a new perspective as I work as a nurse after graduation.
September 26, 2013
Todaro-Francheschi’s book is a must read not only for nursing professionals and students, but any health care professional interested in improving quality of life for both themselves and their patient/clients. She discusses many issues including professional collaboration, communication, and end of life care always promoting the idea of the individual caregivers strength coming from a patient-centered compassionate, ethical, and spiritual approach. The book is extremely readable, accessible and lays down a simple methodology for avoiding the many pitfalls that lead to burnout in the healthcare setting. It is simply, terrific.
February 1, 2019
Dr. Franceschi-Todaro asks us to imagine the possibilities for nurses and nursing. She imagines a time when compassion will be valued, when it will figure into acuity levels and staffing calculations, and when advanced practice nurses will assert themselves by vetoing a treatment plan with which they disagree. She advises leaders to allow staff time to tell stories of healing moments and to share their feelings in the process. While this is music to my psych nurse/writer’s ears, it may not grab newer nurses who have been force fed evidence-based practice to the exclusion of practice-based knowledge and the clinical intuition that comes from it.
October 27, 2015
I just quit my job because I got burnt out. I new what my stressors were. I picked up this book hoping what I could have done to change the situation. In that sense I was disappointed. The first two chapters are about nursing and care (which I already knew). It did guide me to go over what went wrong. But it was really short on what I could have done. It talks about how the education of nursing should change but that's not going to help me in the now.
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October 14, 2019I’m not a nurse, but I’m married to one. My daughter is also a nurse. If nursing could rub off onto someone, I’d be covered in it. That’s one of the reasons why I was so curious about what Compassion Fatigue and Burnout in Nursing had to offer to help me understand.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews