About
Join the Compassion Collaborative, an online, facilitated platform that brings people together to support compassionate health cultures.
What’s being decided?
The Commission on Excellence and Innovation in Health (CEIH) is establishing the state's first Compassion Collaborative.
This is an online, interactive space that brings people together to test and share local strategies, challenges, knowledge and ideas to support compassionate cultures in healthcare across South Australia.
We’re looking to build a diverse community of people working across the health sector including private, NGOs and government healthcare services.
By joining you will get:
About
Join the Compassion Collaborative, an online, facilitated platform that brings people together to support compassionate health cultures.
What’s being decided?
The Commission on Excellence and Innovation in Health (CEIH) is establishing the state's first Compassion Collaborative.
This is an online, interactive space that brings people together to test and share local strategies, challenges, knowledge and ideas to support compassionate cultures in healthcare across South Australia.
We’re looking to build a diverse community of people working across the health sector including private, NGOs and government healthcare services.
By joining you will get:
- membership to an online platform which will provide access to a global online community of practitioners, writers, clinicians and researchers and other professionals
- access to contemporary resources
- a facilitated monthly forum with Mary Freer and guests.
The purpose of the Compassion Collaborative is ACTION. We are looking for active involvement from those who choose to join.
Get involved
If you would like to apply to be part of the Compassion Collaborative:
- head to the Expression of Interest website
- complete the details including a couple of sentences to help us understand the skills, energy, ideas or dreams you will bring to the Compassion Collaborative
- include your preferred postal address so we can send you a Welcome Pack.
What are the next steps?
We will consider all applications received and will contact each successful applicant with details for the launch of the Compassion Collaborative.
Contact details
Submit a form on our website or call 8226 0883.
Closing date: 5pm, Friday 7 May 2021
Background
The Commission on Excellence and Innovation in Health (CEIH), in partnership with Mary Freer, is building on the foundations of the Compassion Labs and the Compassion Revolution activated by Freerthinking in 2020 and establishing South Australia’s very own Compassion Collaborative.
Evidence shows that where empathetic communication and compassion are prevalent, clinical teams are:
- more effective
- staff morale is higher
- patient complaints are fewer
- patient quality and safety issues are less likely.
Moreover, these factors deliver improved operational and financial benefits for the whole health system.
Compassionate leadership in healthcare enhances the intrinsic motivation of staff and reinforces their fundamental altruism. This compassionate orientation is diametrically opposed to a culture characterised by blame, fear and bullying.
Compassion also creates psychological safety, such that staff feel confident in speaking out about errors, problems and uncertainties and feel empowered and supported to develop and implement ideas for new and improved ways of delivering services.
Staff work more cooperatively and collaboratively in a compassionate culture, in a climate characterised by cohesion, optimism and efficacy.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the CEIH collaborated with Freer Thinking to host four cohorts of virtual Compassion Labs for 70 participants.
Each cohort of 15-20 people met for 2 hour sessions each week for 3 weeks. A follow up session was held two weeks after the completion of the labs.
A Compassion Lab enabled healthcare staff to:
- develop greater empathy and emotional intelligence
- use neuroscience to transform leadership skills
- create tools to lower stress levels and optimise productivity
- avoid burn out
- build a safer healthcare system.
Evaluation indicated that the participants found Labs useful and noted compassion is not a soft option. It is an evidence-based approach to improving health of staff and outcomes for patients and families.
However, compassion has not been actively discussed, factored in or pursued as SA Health and Local Health Networks (LHN) work environments continue to evolve, become busier and more demanding (especially during the COVID 19 pandemic).
There was a desire among the participants to create a ‘compassion collaborative’ in order to test and share local strategies. The CEIH has since had conversations with several LHNs and other providers about continuing to support the development of more compassionate cultures.
