In 2025, two nurse resident cohorts participated in monthly Caring Science classes to increase understanding of the art and science of human caring as it related to their new nursing careers and personal lives. Each monthly class explored core concepts of caring science; equity, inclusion and diversity to promote care of self and others. Each session offered the opportunity to reflect on self and connect with others through discussion and activities.
Nurse residents also participated in a multi-site mixed methods study to explore the impact of Healing Circles on compassion satisfaction, burnout, secondary traumatic stress, self-care, and social connectedness at baseline, 6 and 12 months.
Healing Circles is a practice designed to embody peer support and brings people together to share, listen and reflect based on a set of agreements. It emphasizes inclusion of shared experience, mutuality, respect and empowerment. Healing Circles were embedded into the nurse residency training curriculum and led by trained facilitators to support a safe and accepting space for the nurses as a form of collective care. Tools to measure:
- The Professional Quality of Life
- Social Connectedness
- Watson Caritas Self-Rating were administered to collect quantitative data.
The cohort that participated in Healing Circles participated in qualitative interviews to understand individual experiences and used to analyze themes across the different medical centers. When comparing outcomes at all time periods for the control and intervention cohort, there was a significant improvement over time with nurses having better Watson Caritas Self-Rating scores (p = 0.043), compassion satisfaction (p=0.003), and less burnout (p=0.044) in the Healing Circles cohort. A recurring theme that bridged internal and interpersonal impact was shared vulnerability. The participants described the Healing Circles as a source of deep emotional processing and normalization of traumatic experiences
Embedding Healing Circles into a new graduate nurse residency program can be an effective intervention to mitigate risks of turnover, burnout, compassion fatigue, and poor coping skills. Healing Circles provided a safe platform for peer support through the sharing and normalization of traumatic experiences, which contributed to a sense of belonging and increased resilience.