Research trends and scientific analysis of publications on burnout and compassion fatigue among healthcare providers

Abstract

Background: Burnout and compassion fatigue are closely related concepts. Burnout is thought to develop from occupational stress while compassion fatigue results from being in a caregiver role leading to inability to get engaged in a caring relation. The objective of the current study was to investigate research trends, themes, citations, and key players of publications on burnout and compassion fatigue among healthcare providers. Methods: A validated search query was developed and implemented in the Scopus database. The study period was all times up to 2019. Results: Research query found 4416 publications. Publications started in 1978. Steep growth in the number of publications was observed in the last decade. There were seven research themes in the retrieved publications; six for burnout and one for compassion fatigue. Approximately 36% of the retrieved publications were about nurses; 36% were about physicians, 10% were about medical residents and the remaining did not include a specific profession. The retrieved publications received an average of 22.2 citations per article. Four of the top 10 active journals were in the field of nursing and two in the field of general medicine, one in public health, one in neurology, one in psychology, and one was multidisciplinary. The USA ranked first with 1292 (29.3%) articles followed by Spain (n = 248; 5.6%) and the UK (n = 247; 5.6%). Mayo Clinic was the most active institution (n = 93; 2.1%) followed by Harvard University (n = 46; 1.0%) and University of Washington, Seattle (n = 45; 1.0%). A total of 16,108 authors participated in publishing the retrieved documents, an average of 3.6 authors per article. Shanafelt, T.D. was the most active author (n = 78; 1.8%) followed by Dyrbye, L.N. (n = 43; 1.0%), and West, C.P. (n = 37; 0.8%). A total of 472 (10.7%) articles declared funding. Conclusion: The current study was carried out to draw attention to the wellbeing of healthcare providers. Retrieved literature was dominated by high-income countries. Lack of information from low- and middle-income countries will hinder planning for interventional strategies and will negatively affect the health system and the patients. Health researchers in low- and middle-income countries need to focus on burn out and compassion fatigue.