An Exploratory Study of the Impact of Kindness Videos in Health Care Settings

The present study builds on the earlier work with a focused application of inspiring content in health care settings. It is well described that health care providers, including doctors, nurses, and other staff members) have high rates of burnout, depression, and suicide-approximately twice that of the general population. In addition to the lower quality of life for the individual health care provider, this burnout problem has consequences for the patient, including heightened number of medical errors.

Patients, of course, also have significant stressors in their lives. Perhaps, those center on health-related issues, or are more general in nature. In the general population, it is known that anxiety, perceived stress, opiate abuse, and suicide are all rising.

From the patients' perspective, it is important to encourage them to adapt behaviors and attitudes that will benefit themselves as well as others. It has been shown that being kind and compassionate can yield positive impacts on health: people who volunteer regularly, for example, have death rates 20-40% lower than those who do not. Another facet of inducing kindness and compassion is kindness towards oneself. In health care settings, behavioral modification is very challenging. One way to rethink that approach is teaching and illustrating to patients how kindness to oneself is a necessity. Kindness to oneself encompasses following physician instructions as well as general health practice. By providing inspiring visual content to both patients and providers, it is believed that at least additive if not synergistic interaction will occur with simultaneous promotion of kindness, compassion, joy and love for both groups.

To date, multiple publications have pointed to the observation that various types of media can inspire viewers such that they are "moved" or "touched" or "elevated." Most of these studies have focused on the use of single films from several minutes long to full length feature films.

Much of the above cited research has been done in a laboratory or structured research setting. While very valuable, this research plan focuses on a "real world" setting, i.e., with patients and practitioners at the source in their work environments. The first step is to measure responses from both providers and patients.