The high level of complexity, technification and bureaucratisation of our current healthcare system means that nursing professionals are highly occupied with the tasks that this entails, while the possibility of meeting the sick person being cared for has diminished. On a daily basis, nurses work with situations of pain and suffering, they must deal with issues of great intimacy and accompany or make decisions that have a great psycho-emotional impact. All this with hardly any specific training and with a significant pressure of care load that is perceived and expressed as discomfort, tiredness and/or fatigue.
Compassion Fatigue (CF) is a type of Burnout that affects professionals who continuously work with people in a situation of suffering. Exposure to suffering leaves its mark and this can have greater or lesser depth depending on some factors that help to aggravate it or to grow with this experience.
The concept of CF was used by Joinson (1992), in a study carried out with emergency nurses, but it was Figley (1995) who coined it as "Compassion fatigue", translated as "Empathy fatigue". Empathy is a term closely related to compassion, coming from the Greek em-patheía, and was originally translated as "passion-within", "in affection". Today, the dictionary defines it as the ability to identify with someone and share their feelings. Compassion requires the attitude of empathy; however, it does not stop at emotional identification but implies a mobilisation of personal resources to relieve the other person. This is considered one of the virtues of the health professions.
CF is the response to the suffering of an individual rather than to the work situation. Its main difference with Burnout Syndrome is that while the latter arises from the interaction of the professional with his or her work environment, fatigue is related to the wear and tear produced by the interaction with the sick person.