We are proud to play a role in a new study published in the online journal, BMC Emergency Medicine, that identifies compassion as the greatest predictor of patients’ overall quality ratings, surpassing other traditional factors such as wait times, clinical communication, and pain and symptom management.
The HQCA in partnership with University of Calgary Nursing professor and director of the Compassion Research Lab Dr. Shane Sinclair, PhD, and Innovate Calgary, completed a large study measuring the impact of compassion in the 14 busiest provincial emergency departments.
Compassion was measured using the SCQ (Sinclair Compassion Questionnaire), a valid and reliable tool developed by Sinclair and his team which includes University of Calgary Department of Psychology, Faculty of Arts doctoral candidate Harrison Boss, and Dr. Cara MacInnis, adjunct associate professor, University of Calgary and professor, Acadia University.
The study participants were surveyed shortly after being discharged from the ED where 50 per cent of them went home and 50 per cent were admitted to hospital. They all completed a version of the Emergency Department Patient Experience of Care survey by the HQCA along with 15 additional questions from the SCQ.
“This work has not only advanced our understanding of compassion but also affirmed it as a key indicator of health service quality and people-centred care,” says Markus Lahtinen, HQCA’s senior director of health system analytics.
“Measuring compassion fosters a more empathetic and supportive environment, which can enhance the overall quality of care provided. As well, quantifying compassion helps identify areas for improvement, ensuring that health-care professionals maintain high standards of patient interaction and emotional support.”
Part of the HQCA’s mandate is to assess and report on patient-reported experiences with healthcare services in Alberta, for the purposes of quality improvement. Going forward, our survey tools will now include, where appropriate, the Sinclair compassion questions as an important measure of patient experience, a critical aspect of our overall assessment of healthcare quality in Alberta.