COMPARISON OF QUALITY ASSURANCE, EMPATHY, AND BURNOUT IN HEALTHCARE PEOPLE SETTINGS: A DESCRIPTIVE STUDY OF PATIENTS AND HEALTHCARE ASSOCIATES
The aim of this study was to investigate whether the quality of care provided by primary care physicians and nurses varied according to levels of burnout and empathy. We conducted a descriptive study of the medical staff (nurses and family doctors) employed in the Bangladesh. There are fifteen district health facilities and one tertiary health center in the district. A voluntary, anonymous survey on burnout and empathy was sent by email to all 220 healthcare populations registered in the district between January 2023 and December 2023. The data distribution was examined using the Chi-square test, which were also used to choose the best coefficient for the correlation analysis. For data that was regularly distributed, the Pearson coefficient was utilized, and for data that was not normally distributed, the Spearman coefficient. Chi-square analysis was used to compare associations. We stratified the results according on age, sex, occupation, and place of employment. Using SPSS version 23.0, means, percentages, and standard deviations were computed. High burnout practitioners showed higher QSI ratings, but there was no statistically significant difference between them and practitioners in the low and medium burnout groups. There were no variations found based on the degree of empathy. There were no discernible correlations between QSI scores and empathy or fatigue. Practitioners with high burnout scored higher than those with low burnout (721.8 vs.669.9), while practitioners with poor empathy scored higher than those with strong empathy (663.8 vs. 654.4). Empathy among medical professionals has been found to have a direct impact on patients' health. In a patient primary care context, burnout and empathy did not significantly affect the quality of care provided; however, we did observe an unexpected trend suggesting that family physicians and nurses with higher degrees of burnout give higher-quality care. To further explore this pattern, more research is required.