Characterizing Empathy, Compassion, and Burnout in Veterinary Students: A Mixed-Methods Cross-Sectional Observation

Veterinarians experience chronic workplace stress and exhibit high levels of burnout. Empathy may play a role in predisposing veterinarians to burnout. This mixed-methods study aimed to characterize levels of empathy, compassion, and key dimensions of burnout (e.g., emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment) in veterinary medical students at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine. In addition, it tested the hypotheses that high empathy would be associated with high emotional exhaustion and depersonalization and that high compassion would be associated with high personal accomplishment. The study also included a qualitative question about empathy learning. A sample of 196 students represented a 37.6% response rate. Students reported feeling emotionally exhausted and personal accomplishment between "a few times a month" to "once a week" and callous or detached "a few times a year." Empathy was positively correlated with emotional exhaustion but showed no correlation with depersonalization. Compassion was not correlated with personal accomplishment. Qualitative analysis revealed confusion about the concept of empathy. Study limitations included a cross-sectional design, selection bias, reliance on self-reported measures, a single item assessing the ability of students to regulate their emotions, slight rewording of the burnout question, and a sample size that may have limited the statistical power to detect differences between compassion and empathy. Results suggest that clarifying the different elements of empathy and informing veterinary students of the importance of emotional self-awareness and building skills in emotional regulation could help students advance their present and future sense of flourishing.