Compassion Fatigue and Burnout in Nursing : Enhancing Professional Quality of Life

“Dr. Todaro-Franceschi calls us to look with open eyes, open hearts, and open minds at the good, the bad, the ugly, and the ugliest in health care so that together we can cultivate a healthcare world in which compassion prevails and our shared humanity is embraced… It is up to all of us to hold and safeguard each other in this sacred work. Dr. Todaro-Franceschi helps us in this mission through this extraordinary book.”

Mary Koloroutis, RN, MSN

CEO Creative Health Care Management, Minneapolis, Minnesota

Co-Creator of the Relationship-Based Care Model

In this second edition of her seminal text, Dr. Todaro-Franceschi offers new insights on professional quality of life, incorporating current practice, research literature, and examples to show how contentment and happiness of the nursing workforce is related to quality of care. The book provides practical strategies for dealing with a myriad of issues, including compassion fatigue, burnout, moral distress, caring for the dying, PTSD, and workplace violence. This resource will help empower nurses so they can create a more compassionate work environment.

Written by an acknowledged expert in end of life education, professional quality of life, and clinical leadership, the text addresses the complex nature of well-being in the nursing workforce. Supported by research but written from a holistic and personal perspective, the text includes case studies and exercises that will help the reader to identify negative patterns and explore ways to find purpose in one’s life.

New to the Second Edition:

• Expanded emphasis on how workforce well-being contributes to care quality
• Updated resources and information on national nursing initiatives related to professional quality of life
• New chapter on workplace violence (incivility, bullying and mobbing)
• New chapter on education related to improving PQOL and work environment
• Provides a Nurse Leaders Resource Toolkit to guide staff education

Key Features:

• Articulates an ethic of care developed from a transdisciplinary perspective
• Increases nurse awareness of issues that might be hindering their PQOL
• Provides strategies for enhancing staff contentment and productivity, thereby promoting a healthy work environment
• Includes real-life examples from critical care, end-of-life care, hospice, oncology, and more
• Assists nurses with grief healing

Vidette Todaro-Franceschi, PhD, RN, FT, is professor emerita of nursing of the City University of New York, having taught at Kingsborough, Hunter, The College of Staten Island, and the Graduate Center for a combination of over 25 years. A registered nurse for 41 years, she has worked in a variety of roles and settings as staff, head nurse, assistant director, clinical supervisor, clinical nurse specialist, consultant and educator. Most of her practice career was spent working in critical care areas, which later led to scholarly work in the areas of holistic health and healing, end-of-life/palliative care, and professional quality of life. A CUNY child, she earned her AAS and BSN in nursing at the College of Staten Island and her MS in nursing at Hunter-Bellevue School of Nursing. Dr. Todaro-Franceschi earned her PhD in nursing at New York University, where she performed a transdisciplinary philosophical inquiry on ideas of energy, for which she earned several awards. She is the author of two books, many articles, chapters, and digital stories. Her first authored book, The Enigma of Energy, is based on her doctoral research; she has since then performed seminal research in the areas of bereavement healing, end-of-life nursing education, and professional quality of life, and has been consulted by professionals around the world about her work. A passionate voice for nursing, she has presented locally, nationally, and internationally on end of life and professional quality of life. She has been an End-of-Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC) trainer since the first cohort in 2001.