Impact of Compassion Fatigue on Care Behaviors in Intensive Care Nurses

Objective: The aim of the study was to examine the effect of compassion fatigue on care behaviors in intensive care unit (ICU) nurses. Methods: The research was a cross-sectional type. It was conducted with 98 nurses working in adult ICUs of a university hospital. Nurses who had been working in the ICU for at least six months, were not diagnosed with a psychological disease, and agreed to participate in the study were included in the study. Data were collected to the Introductory characteristics form, Compassion Fatigue-Short Scale (CF-SS) and the Care Behaviors Scale-24 (CBS-24). Results: The average age of the nurses was 31.23±5.81 years and 66.3% were women. The average working year of the nurses was 7.12±4.98, the average weekly working hours was 45.22±4.69, and the average number of patients they cared for in a day was 3.21±1.32. The total score of CF-SS of the participating in the study was 63.36±25.77 and the total score of CBS-24 was 5.19±0.55. A negative and weakly significant relationship was found between nurses’ CBS-24 and CF-SS scales total scores (p<0.05). In addition, a statistically significant difference was found between the genders of the nurses and the mean score of CBS-24 (p<0.05). It was determined that female nurses had higher levels of perception of care behaviors than men. Conclusion: In this study, it was found that ICU nurses experienced moderate compassion fatigue and their level of perception of care behaviors was high. The compassion fatigue experienced by ICU nurses has a negative effect on their care behaviors.