DOI: 10.33962/roneuro-2022-090 Letter to Editor The practice of empathy in neurocritical care - an important aspect Ebtesam Abdulla, Amit Agrawal, Rafael Cincu, Tariq Janjua, Luis Rafael Moscote -Salazar Romanian Neurosurgery (2022) XXXVI (4): pp. 494-495 DOI: 10.33962/roneuro-2022-090 www.journals.lapub.co.uk/index.php/roneurosurgery Letter to Editor The practice of empathy in neurocritical care - an important aspect Ebtesam Abdulla1, Amit Agrawal2, Rafael Cincu3, Tariq Janjua4, Luis Rafael Moscote-Salazar5 1 Department of Neurosurgery, Salmaniya Medical Complex, Manama, BAHRAIN 2 Department of Neurosurgery, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Saket Nagar, Madhya Pradesh, INDIA 3 Department of Neurosurgery, General University Hospital, Valencia, SPAIN 4 Department of Critical Care Medicine, Physicians Regional Medical Center, Naples, FL, USA 5 Colombian Clinical Research Group in Neurocritical Care, Bogota, COLOMBIA The dehumanization of medicine has been a subject of debate in recent years with its implications. The dehumanization of medicine has repercussions for the patient, the doctor, and the health team. For the doctor-patient relationship to be successful, it requires an empathetic neurointensivist to the patient's needs. Physicians have to communicate and understand patients’ needs, directions, beliefs, and expectations in order to help them therapeutically. Through empathy, physicians manage to make adequate professional judgments with an understanding of patient experiences and develop moral behaviors. Empathy is defined as a process of the cognitive order with positive repercussions for the doctor [1]. Neurocritical care practice is firmly supported by numerous scientific and technological advances. Scientists hypothesized that empathy is based on the interaction of its affective and cognitive components [2].It is basically, how to perceive others’ emotions, mentalize the perceived input, and execute mature functions [3]. While treating patient in neurocritical care units particularly in emergency scenarios for example a patient with severe brain injuries, the patient not only the patient himself might be in a position to make decision also many a times family members may not be immediately to make decisions for the patient. In these situations, team members need training, experience, and direction in order to demonstrate empathy for the needs of patients. For treatment consent, neurointensivists Keywords empathy, neurocritical care Corresponding author: Ebtesam Abdulla Department of Neurosurgery, Salmaniya Medical Complex, Manama, Bahrain Dr.Ebtesam@hotmail.com Copyright and usage. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non–Commercial No Derivatives License (https://creativecommons .org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) which permits non- commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of the Romanian Society of Neurosurgery must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work. ISSN online 2344-4959 © Romanian Society of Neurosurgery First published December 2022 by London Academic Publishing www.lapub.co.uk http://www.lapub.co.uk/ 495 The practice of empathy in neurocritical care - an important aspect must describe, with empathy, in the patient's file the reason for every therapy or operation requiring permission for which consent cannot be acquired. Waiting for formal permission may delay therapy, care effects, and the end result. To provide effective therapy direction to families with a language barrier, it is necessary to comprehend their thinking. Empathy teaches us those patients are highly intelligent in their languages and cultures, regardless of the severe neurological crisis they are experiencing. In contrast, physician burnout is an enduring condition that will likely worsen over time. Neurointensivists have the same difficulty, and the current COVID-19 epidemic has not improved the situation. There is a greater need for experienced intensivists to be reminded of the need for empathy in neurocritical care and for novice intensivists to get training in this area. A formal patient survey has aided in providing input for the empathy evaluations and development programs [4,5] On the medicolegal side of medical practice, there is a quantifiable effect. Since it is a cognitive process, doctors must be multipliers of empathetic behaviors, as empathy can be taught. Our ICUs and neurosurgical teams have a tremendous duty to foster an attitude of empathy. Formal workshops [6] and educational seminars may be of assistance. A system to include and impart culture of empathy reated training in education needs to be in place, also more research needs to be performed particularly address the issues faced in critical care settings to find out what can make involved professionals more empathetic. REFERENCES 1. Mercer SW, Reynolds WJ. Empathy and quality of care. Br J Gen Pract. 2002 Oct;52 Suppl(Suppl):S9-12. 2. van Dongen JDM. The Empathic Brain of Psychopaths: From Social Science to Neuroscience in Empathy. Front. Psychol. 2020 11:695. 3. Preston SD, and de Waal FBM. Empathy: its ultimate and proximate bases. Behav. Brain Scence. 2022 25, 1–72. 4. Howick J, Steinkopf L, Ulyte A, Roberts N, Meissner K. How empathic is your healthcare practitioner? A systematic review and meta-analysis of patient surveys. BMC Med Educ. 2017 Aug 21;17(1):136. 5. Stewart R, Hobbs K, Dixon K, et al. Perceptions of quality of communication in family interactions in neurocritical care. Health Sci Rep. 2021;4:e411. doi: 10.1002/hsr2.411 6. Kang ES, Genova TD, Howick J, Gottesman R. Adding a dose of empathy to healthcare: What can healthcare systems do? J Eval Clin Pract. 2022 Jun;28(3):475-482.