Showing Compassion in Health Care Setting

Compassion is a phenomenon that has gradually received universal attention over the last decade both in public debate and the healthcare sector. It has been an issue that is simultaneously discussed. From prehistory when the first humans began to interact socially, up until today, compassion has been crucial to caring relationship. The well-known American philosopher Martha Nussbaum discusses compassion at length in her 2001 book on the intelligence of emotions. Nussbaum claims that, based on an Aristotelian view of suffering and what suffering evokes, that compassion originates in the idea of ‘the eudemonistic argument’. Individuals have this knowledge that fate can strike them as it has struck the one, they feel compassion for. Hence recognizing a general human vulnerability calls for compassion. Since the historical influences of Florence Nightingale, compassion has underpinned traditional philosophies of care across the international professional nursing context. More so, due to increasing patient reports of care experiences reflecting a lack of compassion, the withstanding reality of this traditional nursing philosophy has been challenged.Showing Compassion in Health Care Setting