Half-day, online (MS Teams) 11th February 2027, (9.30-13.00) This interactive half-day webinar from the Stoneygate Centre for Empathic Healthcare explores

Half-day, online (MS Teams)

11th February 2027, (9.30-13.00)

This interactive half-day webinar from the Stoneygate Centre for Empathic Healthcare explores the what, why, and how of teaching empathy. Drawing on current evidence and practice from the Stoneygate Centre for Empathic Healthcare, participants will examine frameworks such as therapeutic empathy and the CARE Measure, and learn practical strategies to foster empathy in medical education. Participants will also work collaboratively to design a teaching intervention tailored to their clinical or educational context.

This course is aimed at clinical educators, supervisors, and healthcare professionals involved in training students or junior colleagues. Whether you’re based in a university, hospital, or community setting, if you’re looking to embed empathy in medical education or workplace learning, this session is for you.

Reactivating Healthcare Empathy via Transdisciplinary Research, Patient Perspectives, and Immersive Learning

The Healthcare EmpathyRx Lab conducts transdisciplinary research to develop healthcare education interventions that sustain empathy, cultural awareness, and health-related literacy challenges within health professions and across the health education and professional development journey.

We blend insights from neuroeducation, the art and science of nursing and medical education with innovative technologies to enhance healthcare practice. With the support of SDSU’s VITaL Research Center and the expertise of our industry advisors, we aim to nurture a more compassionate and competent healthcare future for all. Our advisors bring invaluable expertise and real-world perspectives, ensuring our interventions are both innovative and practical, meeting the evolving needs of the healthcare industry.

We tend to think of empathy and compassion as traits we either have or don't. But research tells a different story. Empathy unfolds. It deepens layer by layer as we encounter, sit with, and genuinely engage a human story. Which means that every time we interrupt, assume, or finish someone's story, we don't just miss information—we short-circuit the empathy process itself.

This session draws on original research into empathy decline in healthcare and the conditions that reverse it. Using complexity theory as a lens, participants will explore why empathy erosion is a wicked problem that resists single solutions, and why storytelling, story listening, and intentional reflection and structured debrief protocols are among the most powerful micro-interventions available. Grounded in both science and practice, the session uses story as both subject and method.

Participants will leave with:
• A new mental model: empathy as a dynamic process grounded in story
• A practical, repeatable storytelling, listening, and reflection protocol for clinical settings
• One insight they can apply in their next patient encounter

From healthcare providers in the UK, Europe and the US, evidence is mounting that empathy is more than a bedside virtue.
by Jeremy Howick

Organisations that support their staff and build compassionate cultures achieve better patient outcomes, lower costs and stronger performance, argues Professor Jeremy Howick at the University of Leicester.

A hospital that treats its staff well, maintains manageable workloads, fosters empathic leadership and creates an environment where people feel heard and valued: is that good management, or good medicine? The answer, it turns out, is both. And we can now measure it.

Research from England, Europe and the United States points to the same trend: empathy is not just a quality of individual clinicians. It is a characteristic of high-performing healthcare organisations.

To test whether empathy could be measured, we analysed data from 104 NHS hospital trusts in England, drawing on regulator (Care Quality Commission) ratings, staff surveys, workforce records and financial accounts.[1]  

Empathy and compassion in One Health: Perspectives across disciplines, species and ecosystems 
Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, University of Edinburgh 

Please join us at this inaugural event of the Edinburgh Empathy Place, an initiative of the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies at the University of Edinburgh. The conference will host international leaders and experts from the Global Empathy in Healthcare Network and is being held in collaboration with the University of Edinburgh’s Global Compassion and Empathy Initiative. We are delighted this conference is part of the Edinburgh Medical School’s 300th year anniversary celebrations.

Dr. Jeremy Howick is a clinical epidemiologist and Director of the Stoneygate Centre for Excellence in Empathic Healthcare at the University of Leicester. In this episode, using evidence based-research, he describes how why it’s critical to embed empathy in the delivery of healthcare, and how empathy can prevent burnout in practitioners.

00:00 Preview
00:29 Introduction
00:50 About Jeremy Howick
02:21 The science behind empathic healthcare
04:04 The value of empathy training for practitioners
10:37 The connection between empathy and practitioner burnout
14:09 Shortcomings of the medical school curriculum
18:52 The importance of fostering interprofessional empathy
22:48 Building an empathic ecosystem in healthcare
25:55 Jeremy Howick’s Purposeful Empathy Story

Health policy is motivated by a variety of factors including moral concerns, values and convictions. Policymakers are motivated to consider how constituents and those directly impacted by policies will react to the policies they enact. Thus, it is advantageous for policymakers to understand the psychological processes that shape constituents' reactions toward health policies. We outline how and when policymakers and constituents are motivated to empathize, moralize, and compromise on divisive health policies, such as opioid-related policies, by considering the motivational frameworks of empathy and the plurality of moral values that inform attitudes.

We offer insight for policymakers balancing tradeoffs between different moral values and concerns, suggesting that policymakers should consider cultivating an active dialogue around the relevant moral emotions felt by both supporters and opponents. For example, when considering syringe services programs, supporters and opponents may both be motivated by the moral concern of harm—as supporters may see services as preventing infections and keeping people healthy, while opponents may see services as promoting drug use and in turn, harmful health outcomes.

We suggest that such a morally pluralistic effort will (1) highlight moral alignment amongst supporters to cultivate collective resolve and (2) acknowledge the competing moral concerns of opponents so that they feel understood and in turn, feel more willing to understand competing perspectives. While leaning into moral emotions may feel like a turn toward divisiveness, we suggest that acknowledging the plurality of moral values at stake sets the foundation for support and compromise.

Dan’s experience reveals the power of empathy in healing. Research by Kitzmüller et al. (2019) backs it up by showing that empathic care and listening to people’s stories led to improved recovery and a greater sense of meaning and manageability. Yet, what happens when the healing power of empathy backfires and leads to burnout?

University of Phoenix has launched "Communicating with Compassion and Empathy," a new professional development training pathway designed to help organizations strengthen empathetic communication, support employee well-being and navigate emotionally complex workplace interactions. The four-hour pathway provides practical learning experiences focused on active listening, emotional management, sensitive conversations and strategies for addressing compassion fatigue.

"As organizations continue to prioritize employee well-being and meaningful workplace interactions, there is growing value in helping employees develop communication skills that support empathy, understanding and professionalism," said Mukund Sudarsan, vice president and general manager of Professional Development Programs at University of Phoenix. "This pathway provides practical tools that can help employees communicate effectively, manage emotional situations and contribute to supportive workplace environments."

We must teach students how to protect themselves
In medical education, we lionize empathy. It is all over our mission statements, student evaluations and admissions essays. But what we do not always acknowledge is this: empathy, in its rawest form, comes at a cost. If we ask students to feel everything without teaching them how to protect themselves, we set them up for compassion fatigue and burnout.

We often teach empathy as “putting yourself in someone else’s shoes.” Official definitions label empathy as the act of understanding or being sensitive (even vicariously experiencing) the feelings, thoughts and experiences of others.

Empathic Leadership and Culture Change
The New Drivers of Patient Experience Excellence
Healthcare organizations are under growing pressure from workforce burnout, staffing shortages, rising patient expectations, technology overload, and increasing complexity across care delivery. In this timely panel discussion, leaders from across Mass General Brigham will explore why empathic leadership and culture transformation have become critical drivers of both workforce well-being and patient experience.

Moderated by empathy researcher Helen Riess, this panel brings together senior clinical, quality, patient experience, and operational leaders from Mass General Brigham to share practical lessons and measurable strategies for leading through today’s healthcare challenges. Attendees will leave with actionable insights to strengthen leadership communication, supporting clinical teams, and creating more sustainable cultures that improve both the workforce and patient experience.

Strengthen organizational resilience, trust, retention, and patient outcomes through empathic leadership

Address burnout, communication breakdowns, workforce fatigue, and technology burden across care environments

Implement culture change strategies drawn from real-world frontline experience and operational leadership

Connect patient experience, quality, safety, and workforce well-being as part of a unified organizational strategy

Build accountable, compassionate, and engaged cultures during periods of ongoing stress and transformation

By, Alex Lopez

Do empathetic healthcare organisations deliver better care? 
Howick has spent more than a decade researching what empathy does inside healthcare systems and, critically, what destroys it. His most recent study, the first of its kind, built a system empathy index across NHS trusts in England and tested whether more empathic organisations actually deliver better care.

The results are stark. A healthcare trust scoring just 2.5% higher on the empathy index had 76% higher odds of being rated good or outstanding for patient safety, and 46% greater odds of being rated good or outstanding for effectiveness. Higher empathy scores were also associated with lower staff burnout, lower sickness absence, and lower spending on agency and temporary staff – the very pressures that Nottingham’s maternity unit was drowning in.

On Jan. 8, the film “NURSE: Empathy Heals” premiered at the ETSU Martin Center. The film is the culmination of the Nurse Narratives Initiative, a collaborative effort of ETSU College of Nursing, Ballad Health, the Tennessee Center for Nursing Advancement and StoryCollab. The initiative has worked with nurses, nursing students, faculty and patients to tell their stories through a series of reflective workshops.

Executive Director of StoryCollab Allison Myers said the organization, which is a platform of the ETSU Research Corporation, supports participatory media. In participatory media, StoryCollab works to help individuals and communities tell their stories and focuses on building processes that equip participants to share their own experience the way they feel is best. The storytellers own the rights to their stories, helping establish authenticity and autonomy with respect to their stories.

“NURSE: Empathy Heals” documents a particular workshop from the initiative. Directed by an Emmy Award-winning filmmaker, the documentary uses a narrative style to tell the often-untold story of nurses.

“It’s important that people see nurses as human,” Myers said.

Allison Myers and Dr. Dena Evans, share with us all the details of the film "Nurse: Empathy Heals" that premieres this Thursday evening at Martin Center for the Arts at ETSU! Please watch the video to discover more about this powerful film that tells the narrative and stories of Nurses lived experiences.