Abstract

Compassion fatigue affects healthcare professionals who treat youngsters with life-threatening illnesses. This study set out to illustrate how members of an interdisciplinary paediatric palliative home care team felt and how they reacted to certain situations. A qualitative case study with 18 individuals was carried out. The home-based, multidisciplinary paediatric palliative team was part of the deliberate sampling technique approach. Semi-structured interviews and the field notes of the researchers were used to gather the data. There was a theme analysis. Two themes emerged; improving life, which explained how professionals value life more and how helping children and families gives them a sense of fulfilment from their compassion, which affect their job satisfaction and may lead to burnout, showing how experiencing in-hospital child detention can have an adverse effect on job satisfaction. Our study describes potential reasons why professionals caring for kids with life-threatening illnesses experience emotional discomfort and recommends techniques that can help them feel less distressed.