Mindfulness training in medical education as a means to improve resilience, empathy, and mental health in the medical profession.
Edison Iglesias de Oliveira Vidal, Luiz Fernando Alvarenga Ribeiro, Marco Antonio De Carvalho-Filho, Fernanda Bono Fukushima
World Journal of Psychiatry April 19, 2024 DOI: 10.5498/wjp.v14.i4.489 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Meditation |
| Keywords | Medical education Medical students Mental capital Mental health Resilience |
| Citations | 6 |
| Key points | Argues that mindfulness-based practices can develop mental capital components and enhance interpersonal skills, and that integrating them into medical curricula could address the mental health crisis in the profession. |
Abstract
The high rates of depression, burnout, and increased risk of suicide among medical students, residents, and physicians in comparison with other careers signal a mental health crisis within our profession. We contend that this crisis coupled with the inadequate acquisition of interpersonal skills during medical education results from the interaction between a challenging environment and the mental capital of individuals. Additionally, we posit that mindfulness-based practices are instrumental for the development of major components of mental capital, such as resilience, flexibility of mind, and learning skills, while also serving as a pathway to enhance empathy, compassion, self-awareness, conflict resolution, and relational abilities. Importantly, the evidence base supporting the effectiveness of mindfulness-based interventions has been increasing over the years, and a growing number of medical schools have already integrated mindfulness into their curricula. While we acknowledge that mindfulness is not a panacea for all educational and mental health problems in this field, we argue that there is currently an unprecedented opportunity to gather momentum, spread and study mindfulness-based programs in medical schools around the world as a way to address some longstanding shortcomings of the medical profession and the health and educational systems upon which it is rooted.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on meditation, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mindfulness: A proposed operational definition. | 2004 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Mechanisms of mindfulness | 2005 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| How Does Mindfulness Meditation Work? Proposing Mechanisms of Action From a Conceptual and Neural Perspective | 2011 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy for depression | 2006 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Self-awareness, self-regulation, and self-transcendence (S-ART): a framework for understanding the neurobiological mechanisms of mindfulness | 2012 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
Citations in the library
Cited by 2
Cites 5
- How Does Mindfulness Meditation Work? Proposing Mechanisms of Action From a Conceptual and Neural Perspective Perspectives on Psychological Science October 14, 2011
- Teaching mindfulness in medical school: where are we now and where are we going? Medical Education July 10, 2013
- Six-year positive effects of a mindfulness-based intervention on mindfulness, coping and well-being in medical and psychology students; Results from a randomized controlled trial PLoS One April 24, 2018
- The effect of mindfulness interventions on stress in medical students: A systematic review and meta-analysis. PLoS One 2023
- Effectiveness of mindfulness-based interventions on empathy: A meta-analysis. Frontiers in Psychology October 20, 2022