Social support, empathy and compassion fatigue among clinical nurses: structural equation modeling

Abstract

Our findings show that social support mediates the relationship between empathy and compassion fatigue among clinical nurses. This finding suggests that increasing nurses' social support can decrease the prevalence of compassion fatigue. Nursing managers should provide training related to flexibly adjusting empathy and educating nurses to establish effective social networks with family, friends, and colleagues to prevent compassion fatigue.