Relationships between death anxiety and empathy among medical students (pilot study)

LTReikšminiai žodžiai: Asmeninis distresas; Emocinė empatija; Empatiškas rūpestis; Nerimas dėl kitų mirties; Death of others anxiety; Emotional empathy; Empathetic concern; Personal distress.

ENBackground. Death anxiety is defined as emotionally negative reactions provoked by thoughts about death and dying of self, and death and dying of others (Lester, 1990). Empathy refers to the reactions of one individual to the observed experiences of another (Davis, 1983). As determined by Kurz and Hayes (2006) in their study, death anxiety affects the student’s successful transition from theoretical knowledge to their practical application, while medical empathy has a significant impact on patient satisfaction with treatment (Regehr, Goldberg, Hughes, 2002; Wimmer, Stuber, 2010; Ward, Cody, Schaal, Hojat, 2012) and on adherence to the treatment plan (Wimmer, Stuber, 2010), better disease outcomes and the physician-patient relationship (Caruso, Bernstein, 2014; van Ryn et al., 2014). Research studies on death anxiety among medical students are scarce. The number of articles on death anxiety’s link to empathy in foreign literature is limited, and this relationship has not been fully investigated in the studies conducted. Unfortunately, there are no studies in the Lithuanian language on the relationship between death anxiety and empathy seen as the main subject matter of the research. This suggests that the given field of science has not been fully explored. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationships between death anxiety and empathy among the students of Lithuanian University of Health Sciences. Methods. The study involved 47 third-year medical students of the Faculty of Medicine of Lithuanian University of Health Sciences. A questionnaire designed for the study consisted of demographic questions, empathetic concern and personal distress subscales in the scale of Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI) (Davis, 1980), and the death of others and the dying of others subscales in the revised Collet – Lester Fear of Death and Dying Scale (Lester, 1990).Results & Findings. It has been found that female medical students tend to have more death of others and dying of others anxiety and display higher levels of overall empathy and personal distress than male medical students. It was also found that medical students showing greater empathetic concern have a stronger sense of death of others and dying of others anxiety than students reporting lower levels of empathetic concern. [From the publication]