Purpose: Empathy in medical practice is related to medical
communication and clinical competence. In previous stud ies, low quality of life and other factors play an integral role
in low empathy among physicians. We evaluated the rela tionships between empathy, quality of life, and other factors
among Korean emergency physicians.
Methods: The survey was conducted using email to emer gency physicians. The respondents completed a question naire including demographic information, the Jefferson
Scale of Empathy, and the Brief version of the World Health
Organization Quality of Life assessment instrument.
Correlation analyses were performed, along with sub-analy ses according to gender.
Results: A total of 180 questionnaires were analyzed. The
median value of the empathy scale was 89.0, and quality of
life 64.8. Empathy was positively correlated with quality of
life, age, and work experience as a specialist in total sam ples and males. Only work experience as a specialist
showed correlation with empathy in females. Quality of life
showed no association with age, work experience, and
work load. However, quality of life showed negative correla tion with age and work experience in female physicians.
Conclusion: The more experienced specialist emergency
physicians are, and the better quality of life they have, the
higher level of empathy scale they have. Therefore, good
quality of life could lead to good empathy, and vice versa.
Good quality of life and good empathy could lead to the bet ter outcome in emergency care. However, because the
female physicians show different patterns of empathy and
quality of life, further study is needed