Date of Award

1-1-2010

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Organizational Unit

Morgridge College of Education

First Advisor

Patrick Sherry, Ph.D.

Second Advisor

Roger Salters

Third Advisor

Kathy Green

Fourth Advisor

Barbara Vollmer

Keywords

Hospital-based, Life time events, Patients, Trauma exposure

Abstract

The present study attempted to determine the relationship between exposure to traumatic experiences of hospitalized children and adolescents and the development of secondary traumatic stress, also known as compassion fatigue, vicarious traumatization, or burnout in clinical staff working with such patients. Hierarchical regression was used to test the hypotheses that: clinical treatment staff will experience higher levels of psychological distress following exposure to patient trauma and previous lifetime trauma events; clinical treatment staff will experience quality of patient relationships associated with the degree of exposure to patient trauma, previous lifetime or work-related trauma history, and level of supervisor support; clinical treatment staff will experience a quality of professional relationships associated with the degree of exposure to patient trauma, previous lifetime or work-related trauma history, and level of supervisor support; clinical treatment staff will experience a quality of self relationship associated with the degree of exposure to patient trauma, previous lifetime or work-related trauma history, and level of supervisor support. Measures included a demographic and previous lifetime trauma events survey developed for this study, a Hospital Trauma Scale also developed for this study, the Compassion Fatigue Self-test, the Maslach Burnout Inventory - Human Services Survey (Emotional Exhaustion subscale), and the Supervisor Support Scale. Results indicated a positive relationship between the development of psychological distress, as evidenced by Compassion Fatigue and Emotional Exhaustion, and exposure to patient trauma and traumatic life events. Additionally, after the effects of education and experience in domains of care were entered, the contribution of degree of hospital trauma experienced contributed significantly to the occurrence of Compassion Fatigue and Emotional Exhaustion. The degree of supervisor support, as measured by the Supervisor Support Scale, did not produce a mediating influence relative to the occurrence of Compassion Fatigue or Burnout. The other findings of interest were that Education played a significant role in the occurrence of Compassion Fatigue and Emotional Exhaustion, as did External Support Sought. Specifically, higher education and external support sought for work-related stress were associated with lower levels of Compassion Fatigue and Emotional Exhaustion.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Randy Allen Braley

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Format

application/pdf

Language

en

File Size

152 p.

Discipline

Psychology, Mental health

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