Meaning & use
compassion fatigue
Last updated
Meanings
noununcountablemedical
A state of emotional tiredness and reduced sympathy in people who care for others over a long period.
Grammar: No plural and no 'a': nurses often suffer from compassion fatigue.
Patterns
- suffer from compassion fatigue
- develop compassion fatigue
- compassion fatigue among workers
After years in the emergency room, she began to show signs of compassion fatigue.
Doctors warned that staff were suffering from compassion fatigue during the pandemic.
Training programs now teach nurses how to recognize compassion fatigue early.
noununcountable
A public's loss of interest in helping after seeing too many disasters or sad stories in the news.
Grammar: Used about audiences and donors, often with 'donor' or 'public': donor compassion fatigue.
Patterns
- public compassion fatigue
- donor compassion fatigue
- compassion fatigue after something
Charities worry about donor compassion fatigue after so many appeals.
Repeated images of the crisis led to compassion fatigue among viewers.
Common combinations
- suffer from compassion fatigue
- Many social workers suffer from compassion fatigue.
- signs of compassion fatigue
- Irritability is one of the early signs of compassion fatigue.
- donor compassion fatigue
- Donor compassion fatigue reduced giving last year.
- prevent compassion fatigue
- Regular breaks can prevent compassion fatigue.
- compassion fatigue among staff
- The survey measured compassion fatigue among hospital staff.
Synonyms and how they differ
- burnout
- Burnout is broader: it covers exhaustion from any job, while compassion fatigue is specifically about losing sympathy for people you care for.
- emotional exhaustion
- A general term for feeling drained; it does not necessarily involve losing compassion.
Opposites
Word family
- compassion noun
- a feeling of pity and kindness for someone who is suffering
- compassionate adjective
- showing kindness and concern for others
- fatigue noun
- extreme tiredness
Commonly confused: compassion fatigue or burnout?
compassion fatigue vs burnout
Burnout is job-related exhaustion from stress and overwork; compassion fatigue focuses on the loss of caring feelings toward others.
Practice
Which sentence uses 'compassion fatigue' correctly?
Choose one answer.
'Compassion fatigue' means emotional tiredness from caring for others, as with the nurse. The other options attach it to food, machines, or objects, which makes no sense.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “compassion fatigue”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.