Empathy is an integral part of nursing and a theory borrowed from Kohut's Self-Psychology Model. Defined as "the capacity to experience the feelings of another as one's own" (Merriam-Webster, 1995, as cited in Walker & Alligood, 2001, p. 140), empathy enables the practicing nurse to experience what her patient is experiencing, thus understanding his pain, his fear, his malaise, and his distress. The term "empathy" comes from the German word Einfuhlung, whose literal meaning is "feeling into," a description that aptly conveys the way a nurse senses the patient's feelings and responds to them (Hojat et al., 2003, p. 26). Through empathy, the nurse can relate better to the patient's perspective and provide care that is more understanding and compassionate.
In Kohut's Self-Psychology Model, the practice was psychotherapy rather than nursing, and the theory of empathy was considered a means of gathering data about the patient; it implied that only "the patient's subjective experience" was an acceptable source of information (Coburn & Shane, 2008, p. 153). This meant that every time the therapist listened to the patient, he did so from an empathic perspective (Coburn & Shane, 2008, p. 153). Kohut did not take his theory so far as to apply empathy to the way the therapist interacted with the patient, but this is a natural next step in the application of his theory to nursing. Although it is a borrowed theory, Kohut's concept of listening with empathy is particularly apt in nursing practice. The nurse that does not listen empathically to her patients is one that misses the majority of what is essential in the patient's communication to her. If the patient says that he is feeling nauseated, for example, but the nurse does not notice that this is because he is anxious and fearful, she may administer an anti-nausea drug when what the patient really needs is to be soothed and comforted so that the nausea will leave. Empa...