Évaluation à six mois de l'impact d'une formation multimodale et séquentielle à l'empathie des étudiants de second cycle d'études médicales.

Context and background: The doctor's empathy has a positive influence on patient health, but a decline in empathy at the start of clinical placements has been observed in the majority of studies. To compensate for this decline, specific interventions are being developed. Objective: The aim of this longitudinal study was to evaluate changes in the empathy of French fourth-year medical students following integrative training in the therapeutic relationship, including theory classes, Balint groups, role-playing and objective structured clinical examinations with standardized patients. Methods: Empathy levels were measured with the French version of the Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy − Medical Student (JSPE-MS) at the beginning and end of the course, and six months later. The study was carried out on matched data from 110 students. The primary endpoint was the difference in mean JSPE-MS scores between the three assessment times. Analyses were performed using Student's t tests for paired data. Results: The results of the matched cohort indicate that the empathy of medical students who completed the training and responded to the study did not change significantly during the fourth year and the six months that followed. Conclusion: Integrative training in the therapeutic relationship, given at the same time as the first clinical clerkships, can help preserve clinical empathy. These results reinforce the value of multimodal, sequential training in empathy for medical students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]