Background: Compassion is a critical component of effective, ethical healthcare, influencing patient care, provider well-being, and organizational culture. Its expression and support vary across cultures, yet little is known about how systemic and cultural factors shape compassionate care. This narrative review examines compassion’s impact on healthcare practices across cultural contexts. Methods: A narrative review of literature published since 2020, searching PubMed, PsycINFO, Scopus and Web of Science was performed. Fifteen studies met our inclusion criteria: peer-reviewed, English-language articles that explicitly examined compassion (or closely related constructs such as self-compassion or compassion fatigue) in healthcare settings and reported empirical, theoretical, or review evidence with attention to cultural or contextual factors. Excluded were articles published before 2020, non-English reports, conference abstracts, and opinion pieces lacking empirical or theoretical contribution. Results: Compassion-focused interventions reduced fatigue and improved self-compassion and satisfaction. Cultural and systemic factors influenced how compassion was understood and applied, from Buddhist-informed to Western models. Institutional culture, leadership, workload, and spiritual care affected practice, while mental health and community care showed benefits but faced systemic barriers. Conclusion: Compassion in healthcare is shaped by individual, cultural, organizational, and systemic factors. Embedding compassion across all these levels is essential for delivering effective, person-centered care. This review contributes by synthesizing recent cross-cultural evidence, highlighting how cultural, structural, and spiritual dimensions influence compassionate care, and identifying gaps in global research. Cross-cultural awareness and structural reform are critical for sustaining compassionate healthcare. Future research should explore underrepresented cultural contexts and evaluate systemic interventions that promote compassion in diverse health systems. Plain Language Summary: Compassion is more than kindness in healthcare—it directly affects how patients heal, how staff cope with stress, and how health systems function. When compassion is supported, patients feel safe and valued, and healthcare providers are better able to manage emotional demands. But when compassion is missing, both care quality and staff well-being suffer. This review shows that compassion is understood and practiced differently across cultures. In some places, it centers on building close personal connections, while in others it reflects values of selfless service, spiritual wisdom, or collective responsibility. These cultural perspectives are important because they shape how patients expect to be cared for and how providers deliver that care. We also found that compassion is not just about individual effort—it depends on the systems around healthcare workers. Supportive leadership, manageable workloads, and training programs make compassion easier to practice, while lack of resources and rigid workplace structures create barriers. By pulling together evidence from recent global research, this review highlights both the promise and the challenges of compassionate care. It underlines the need for hospitals and clinics to embed compassion into policies, staff development, and everyday practice. Strengthening compassion at every level of healthcare can improve recovery, reduce burnout, and make health systems more humane and sustainable.

Cross-cultural psychology evaluates how cultural factors influence people’s behaviour and mental processes. Cross-cultural psychology aims to understand individual differences and commonalities, and to develop an appreciation, respect, and knowledge of cultures distinct from one’s own. Compassion refers to the emotional response of understanding, empathising with, and desiring to alleviate or reduce the suffering or distress of others. Compassion involves noticing the pain or difficulties another person is experiencing and being motivated to help, often characterised by acts of kindness, support, and caring. This entry paper explores the intersection of these two concepts, illustrating how insights from cross-cultural psychology can contribute to fostering compassion.

This study aims to conduct an Urdu translation and a validation of the ISBF Stress Management Skills Scale in two distinct phases. The first phase includes the forward-back translation method for ISBF. The second phase includes cross validation and the establishment of psychometric properties for the ISBF scale. A sample of 500 adults working in health care was taken from different hospitals and dispensaries. The first phase of the study includes the forward-back translation method. The second phase includes exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) with invariance measurement. The total reliability of the scale is reported to be .812. EFA revealed a two-factor structure for ISBF scale, with configural, metric and scalar invariance across males and females, and comparable latent mean scores for males and females. CFA showed goodness-of fit indices for the two factors. The scale showed good internal consistency values. The model fit value includes the value for the goodness of fit index, which was .979, for the adjusted goodness-of fit index: .961, for the comparative fit index: .993, for the incremental fit index: .993, and for the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) value: .033. Good values of composite reliability and convergent validity were measured for both dimensions of the scale. The scale shows that this diagnostic tool can help to assess the skills used to manage stress. For criterion validity, the coping Inventory for Stressful Situations (CISS-21) was used, which showed positive correlations. The subscale of stress management was taken from the Health Promoting Life Style Profile II (HPLP-II), which also showed positive correlations. Significant mean differences were found between scores of healthcare workers with stress management skills and with those without stress management skills. The group of mean differences indicated the females have greater stress management skills as compared to men. The Urdu translated and validated instrument will be helpful in understanding behavior in healthcare settings.

Background: Mental health conditions remain a major yet underrepresented public health concern in Pakistan and globally, highlighting the need for innovative and complementary interventions. Nature-based interventions (NBIs), which involve structured engagement with natural environments to enhance health and wellbeing, offer a promising approach, particularly in the Hazara Division of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan, a region renowned for its Himalayan forests, scenic valleys, and rich biodiversity. Methods: This qualitative exploratory study examined mental health clinicians’ perceptions of the benefits and challenges associated with implementing NBIs in community mental health settings. Fourteen clinicians from the Hazara Division, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan, were recruited between February and March 2026. Data were collected through fourteen semi-structured interviews and analyzed using inductive thematic analysis with HyperRESEARCH software. Participants generally perceived engagement with nature as calming, restorative, and therapeutically beneficial, and many reported informally encouraging clients to participate in nature-related activities. Clinicians expressed willingness to integrate NBIs into routine practice and identified potential benefits including improved mood, relaxation, empowerment, and enhanced social connectedness. However, several barriers were also identified, including client-related factors such as anxiety, low motivation, and skepticism, as well as contextual and organisational constraints such as gender-based limitations in access to natural spaces and safety-related policies. Conclusions: Despite these challenges, clinicians demonstrated strong support for NBIs, suggesting their potential as a feasible adjunct to mental health care in Pakistan. Addressing identified barriers may facilitate the integration of NBIs into routine mental health services and enhance the accessibility of holistic mental health support in community settings.

Aim: To measure impact of nurses’ practice environment, organizational commitment on job satisfaction and intent to leave in hospitals of Pakistan. Study Design: Cross sectional survey; Convenience sampling. Methods: Sample of 240 nurses were drawn from private and public sector hospitals. Nurses’ practice environment (Aiken, Clarke, & Sloane, Hospital Staffing, Organisation and Quality Care: Crossnational Findings, 2002), organizational commitment (Mowday, Steers, & Porter, 1979)   , job satisfaction (Carbonell & Escudero, 2013) and intent to leave (Zopaitis, Constanti, & Theocharous, 2014)   were used as instruments of measurement. Results: Nurse Practice environment with estimate of 0.176 has no significant effect on job satisfaction as the p value was 0.43 which was statistically insignificant ant 0.05. Hospital nurses’ organizational commitment with estimate of 0.043 has no significant effect on job satisfaction as was 0.526 which was statistically insignificant at 0.05. Job satisfaction with estimate of 0.254 has a significant effect on intent to leave as the p value was 0.007 which was statistically significant at 0.05. Hence, it is claimed that job satisfaction has significant impact on intent to leave. Conclusion: The study is integral to have in the field of occupational health psychology and to make sure that nurses are satisfied in their work whether employed in private or public hospitals. Keywords: nurse practice environment, organizational commitment, job satisfaction, intent to leave, nursing, Pakistan  

Aims. The goal of this meteorological psychology study is to understand the behavioral implications on the professional lives of medical professionals in one of the most polluted regions of the world with a compromised air quality index. There is a paucity of literature to explore climate ethics as to how behavioral aspects of morals may alter related to climate change. Methods. The study is a cross-sectional correlational quantitative study formulated through purposive sampling. Research took place during the smog season of the world’s most polluted city. The research instruments of Climate anxiety, pain and distress, and cognitive failure were administered to a sample of 211 medical professionals. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted and resulted in robust model fitness with indices between .80 and .90. Item loadings for three factors were statistically ideal of greater than. 30. Barron and Kenny’s approach was applied to conduct mediation through path analysis in which climate anxiety significantly mediates between pain distress and cognitive failure (β = .51; p < .0001). Multiple regression results using bootstrap confidence showed that climate anxiety (β = .993; p < .0001), and pain distress result in cognitive failure. The independent sample t-test was carried out to explore if nurses and doctors are different in terms of experiencing climate anxiety, pain distress, and cognitive failure. Results. There is a strong significant association among climate anxiety, pain distress, and cognitive failure with strong to moderate correlation values, p < .001. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted and resulted in robust model fitness with indices between .80 and .90. Item loadings for three factors were statistically ideal at .30. 102 Nurses (M = 85.216; SD = 4.94) were more painfully distressed, prone to cognitive failure, and have climate anxiety as compared to 109 doctors (M = 71.211; SD = 9.23).