Compassion Fatigue, Professional Quality of Life, and Psychological Endurance Among Organ Transplant Coordinators

Purpose: Organ transplant coordinators are affected by the experienced traumas of patients and relatives, which increases their risk of compassion fatigue. This study was conducted to determine the effect of compassion fatigue on organ transplant coordinators and to reveal its relationship with professional quality of life and endurance.

Materials And Methods: This descriptive study was carried out between November 2017 and March 2018 among organ transplant coordinators working in Turkey. Out of the total 187 coordinators, 91 (48.6%) agreed to participate. Data collection was performed via a demographic information questionnaire, the 24-item Compassion Scale developed by Pommier, the 30-item Professional Quality of Life (ProQOL) Scale developed by Stamm, and the 33-item Psychological Endurance Scale developed by Friborg et al.

Findings: Among the compassion subscales, the highest mean scores were in the kindness subscale, while the lowest mean scores were received from the indifference subscale. In the ProQOL, the compassion satisfaction subscale received the highest scores. The scores of the Psychological Endurance Scale were also high. There were statistically significant, weak to moderate correlations between all compassion subdimensions with absolute values of correlation coefficients (r) ranging from 0.260 to 0.690 (P < .05). There was a significant positive correlation between the burnout and compassion fatigue/traumatic stress subscales of the ProQOL (r = 0.660; P < .001).

Conclusions: These results demonstrate that ProQOL and psychological endurance are essential determinants of compassion fatigue among organ transplant coordinators. We suggest that correcting the working quality of organ transplant coordinators will reduce compassion fatigue and increase their psychological stability.