The relationship between empathy and the quality of the educational environment in Canadian emergency medicine residents

Purpose Empathy and quality of educational environment appear to be inversely correlated with burnout but the relationship between the two is largely unknown. Our primary objective was to examine the relationship between postgraduate educational environment and empathy. Secondary objectives included impact of gender, residency year and on- versus off-service context on levels of empathy and educational environment. Methods A modified Dillman approach was used to conduct an email survey of Canadian Royal College Emergency Medicine residents in June 2020. The survey instrument included: demographic data, Toronto Empathy Questionnaire (TEQ) and Scan of Postgraduate Educational Environment Domains (SPEED). Logistic and linear regressions evaluated the association between TEQ and SPEED, and mean SPEED scores and covariates, respectively. Results Response rate was 38% (138/363) with representation from all programs. Respondents were mean 30 years of age, 59% men and 25%, 20%, 18%, 24%, and 13% in postgraduate year (PGY) 1-5, respectively. There was no statistically significant association between high/low TEQ scores and mean SPEED score (p = 0.97). There were no statistically significant associations between any of the covariates and high/low TEQ scores (gender, p = 0.21; PGY, p = 0.58; on-versus off-service, p = 0.46) or mean SPEED score (gender, p = 0.95; PGY, p = 0.48; on- versus off-service, p = 0.07). Emergency medicine residents rated their educational environment on average 3.44 (+/- 0.43) out of four. 39 of 134 residents were found to have low empathy. Conclusion There was no association between empathy and educational environment. Further research is needed to elucidate modifiable factors contributing to the development of low empathy in emergency medicine residents.