Background and Purpose: Healthcare workers face numerous challenges daily, including professional obligations, personal safety, and other factors that complicate their working conditions. This study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of compassion-focused therapy on self-esteem, cognitive flexibility, and marital stress reduction in female healthcare workers.
Materials and Methods: This quasi-experimental study employed a pre-test/post-test design with a control group to assess the effect of compassion-focused therapy. The study population consisted of all staff at Imam Khomeini Hospital. Participants were selected through voluntary sampling and randomly assigned to an experimental group and a control group. After coordination with the hospital, research questionnaires (The Self-Worth Questionnaire, Cognitive Flexibility Inventory, and Marital Stress) were distributed among the healthcare staff at an appropriate time. The intervention included eight structured sessions of compassion-focused therapy, each lasting 90 minutes. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS software.
Results: The findings from the analysis of covariance showed that the post-test mean scores for self-worth were significantly higher in the experimental group (M = 124.07, SD = 3.105) compared to the control group (M = 109.20, SD = 4.931). Additionally, for cognitive flexibility, the experimental group showed significantly higher post-test scores (M = 85.67, SD = 5.653) compared to the control group (M = 74.40, SD = 7.500). Regarding marital stress, the experimental group showed a significant reduction in post-test scores (M = 6.47, SD = 1.995) compared to the control group (M = 9.33, SD = 2.024). Furthermore, analysis of demographic variables revealed that there were no significant differences between the experimental and control groups in terms of age and job experience at the 0.05 significance level.
Conclusion: The results suggest that compassion-focused therapy positively impacts marital stress, self-esteem, and cognitive flexibility in healthcare workers. Therefore, hospital human resource management should give adequate attention to these variables.