A 34-year-old man fighting for his life in the Intensive Care Unit is on an artificial respirator for over a month. Could it be that his chance of getting off the respirator is not how much his nurses know, but rather how much they care?

A 75-year-old woman is heroically saved by a major trauma center only to be discharged and fatally struck by a car while walking home from the hospital. Could a lack of compassion from the hospital staff have been a factor in her death?

Compelling new research shows that health care is in the midst of a compassion crisis.

But the pivotal question is this:

In Compassionomics: The Revolutionary Scientific Evidence That Caring Makes a Difference, physician scientists Stephen Trzeciak and Anthony Mazzarelli uncover the eye-opening data that compassion could be a wonder drug for the 21st century. Now, for the first time ever, a rigorous review of the science — coupled with captivating stories from the front lines of medicine—demonstrates that human connection in health care matters in astonishing ways. Never before has all the evidence been synthesized together in one place. You will see compelling evidence that:

Compassion has vast benefits for patients across a wide variety of conditions.
Missed opportunities for compassion can have devastating health effects.
Compassion can help reverse the cost crisis in health care.
Compassion can be an antidote for burnout among health care providers.
Forty seconds of compassion can save a life.

Dominic O. Vachon, MDiv, PhD

By jkettinger 20th May 2019

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But the pivotal question is this:

Does compassion really matter?

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Dominic O. Vachon, MDiv, PhD