Compassion Fatigue among Staff in a Medium Secure Psychiatric Setting: Individual and Environmental Factors

Abstract

Despite a growing interest in compassion fatigue and burnout in mental health staff no study has examined the prevalence and correlates of these occurrences in secure psychiatric settings. Such environments have high levels of violence and disturbed behaviour, and staff care for individuals with treatment-resistant mental illness and personality disorders with whom it is difficult to form a therapeutic alliance. As the potential for the development of compassion fatigue/burnout may be higher than in other settings, issues of staff and patient welfare make it important to understand those factors that can be contributory to the development of such conditions.