Estimated read time: 2 mins
We have likely all been the second victim at some point in our career, but not necessarily recognised the impact of this, usually because our own feelings are clouded by our concern for the patient for whom we have been caring. The second victim arises in the practice of dentistry when, despite all best efforts and intentions a patient is harmed under our care, by our actions and usually as a result of misadventure. While there can be no doubt that any patient who suffers harm is a victim in the purest sense, it is important not to overlook that we, the clinician, suffer along with them, rendering us a victim too – the second victim.
Any clinician who has made a mistake in their practice, or who has seen a patient suffer pain after their care will have experienced the plight of the second victim. This is accompanied with an associated distress that follows you home from work and can permeate every element of your life. Harming a patient leaves a deep wound that is invisible to others but will ache to the point where it is the first thing that you think about in the morning and the last thing that you think about at night, and this ache will persist for quite some time, often long after the patient has been remediated and their issues resolved.
Please know that having empathy for a patient and feeling remorse for an unintended consequence for them is an essential element of being a caring clinician. However, we do need to learn to extend this compassion to ourselves when we find ourselves lacking, and this I am afraid is the hardest task of all.
Regretfully, we can never have risk and mistake free practice (believe me when I say that I truly wish we could), and it would not be appropriate to disconnect our empathy and compassion when dealing with patients. Accordingly, the only element of this conundrum we can work on is ourselves, and we can achieve this by learning to accept failure as a natural part of life and by learning from our mistakes to ensure they are not repeated.
Difficult as it can be to avoid, self-flagellation after error only serves to hurt us and those who care about us. A more helpful and healthy response when something goes wrong in our practice of dentistry is to adopt a growth mindset, seeking to learn from what went wrong rather than plummeting down into our own portable hell.
Rest assured that we are here to help you in every sense, and that includes providing support after an adverse outcome occurs in your practice of dentistry. Prior to this though, investing some time in developing our own resilience and a growth mindset can provide us with protection far beyond what we could imagine it to be. And, we have resources for this too.
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