AO Fellowship in Medical Education Research - The Interaction of Empathy and Emotional Regulation in Surgeons

Empathy is a cognitive function which processes the emotions of others. In medical practice it is related to patient satisfaction, safety and outcomes (1). Poorly developed empathy can increase burnout and impair clinicians’ mental health. Surgical practice deals with patients with high emotion states, dealing with life-threatening illness, complications, and long-term disability. However, surgeons have lower empathy scores than other specialties with high emotional stakes, like psychiatry (2–4). The reason for this is not known. It is not
clear what cognitive processes occur during empathy in the clinical setting and how this is affected by previous experiences or adaptive emotional regulation.
This project will investigate the interaction of empathy and emotional regulation in clinical surgeons. Data will be collected through a series of semi-structured interviews with surgeons. Using thematic analysis and grounded theory, a unifying theory of cognitive processing of emotion and empathy in clinical practice will be developed. Understanding the complex processes of clinical empathy could impact health provision and quality and play a key role in the education of surgeons both in initial training and continuing medical education.