Medical Student Cooper Medical School of Rowan University Camden, New Jersey, United States
Background: Compassion is an emotional response to the pain and suffering of another, involving an authentic desire to help. It is a crucial aspect of high-quality pediatric care, and understanding how patients and parents perceive clinician compassion is the first step to improving our abilities to be compassionate care providers. However, there is currently no validated and feasible method to measure patient experiences of clinician compassion across healthcare systems for pediatric visits.
We previously developed a 5-item compassion measure to assess patient experiences of clinician compassion that can be used in conjunction with the Clinician and Group Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CG-CAHPS) visit survey, and it has been validated in the adult inpatient, outpatient, and emergency department settings. Objective: Our objective is to validate a 5-item compassion tool as a reliable measure of patient assessments of clinician compassion in the pediatric outpatient setting. Design/Methods: In this cross-sectional study, the 5-item compassion measure was incorporated into CG-CAHPS surveys and completed by parents of patients less than 18 years old. Surveys were distributed from February 2023 to September 2023 at a U.S. academic healthcare system. Validity and reliability testing of the 5-item compassion measure was performed using confirmatory factor analysis. Internal reliability was tested using Cronbach’s alpha, and convergent validity with patient assessment of overall satisfaction questions from the CG-CAHPS survey was evaluated using Spearman correlation. Results: We analyzed 640 complete responses. The median (interquartile range) patient age was 8 (3-13) years, and 47% of patients were female. 61% of patients were White/Caucasian and 25% were Black/African American. Confirmatory factor analyses found a good fit. The compassion measure demonstrated good internal consistency (alpha=0.97) and convergent validity with overall satisfaction [=0.63 (95% CI 0.56-0.70)] but reflected a patient experience domain (compassionate care) distinctly different from what is currently captured in CG-CAHPS surveys.
Conclusion(s): Our results suggest that the 5-item compassion measure is a valid tool that can reliably and distinctly measure patient assessments of clinician compassion in the pediatric outpatient setting. In future studies, this measure can be used to evaluate pediatric clinician compassion and test the efficacy of interventions aimed at promoting compassionate care. Ultimately, these efforts can help improve patient experiences and outcomes.
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