Effect of Practitioner Self-Care and Anxiety on Relationships within the Context of Organizational Change

This paper reviews the literature and suggests a causal model of the relationships between practitioner anxiety and effective caring practitioner – patient and practitioner – practitioner relationships within the context of organizational change through introduction of an electronic healthcare record. In the authors’ model, self-care is introduced as a mediating variable using a conceptual framework of Relationship-centered Care. Engaging in frequent and regular self-care interventions has been shown to be related to practitioner – patient caring ability and caring efficacy. According to a published model of Relationship-centered Care, it is anticipated that self-care will mediate the effect of practitioner anxiety on the ability to engage in effective therapeutic relationships with patients and other practitioners. Through this lens and within the context of organizational changes such as implementation of the electronic health record, a conceptual model for research is proposed, research hypotheses are stated, and methodology for a future stream of research is discussed.