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The Efficacy of the iWork.COMP Among Health Care Professionals
Sponsor: University of Coimbra
Summary
According to the literature, the prevalence of anxiety, depression, and/or burnout symptoms among healthcare workers is high. There are several factors than can, directly or indirectly, be related to these symptoms, being the leadership styles one of them. Toxic leadership, as a form of malicious leadership, has been shown to negatively impact the mental health and wellbeing of the workforce, through the adoption of dysfunctional behaviour and/or the presence of deviant personality traits (psychopathic, Machiavellianism, narcissistic) in leaders. Despite its relevance, there is an absence of studies on the efficacy of intervention programs aimed to reduce the impact of toxic leadership styles in the workplace, namely among health care professionals. Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT) is considered an effective therapeutic approach for the rehabilitation of individuals with several psychopathological symptoms/disorders (e.g., anxiety, stress, burnout, and deviant personality traits) and for the establishment of healthy relationships with friends, family, and coworkers. In the workplace, CFT-based interventions have been shown to promote employees' wellbeing, through the reduction of stress and burnout symptoms and improvement of healthy and compassionate interpersonal relationships. It is thus mandatory to develop and test cost-effectiveness CFT-based intervention programs able to mitigate the impact of toxic leadership styles in the workforce, promoting compassionate workplaces in health care systems. To fulfil this gap, this clinical trial intends to develop and preliminarily test the efficacy of a short-term and low-time consuming internet delivery CFT-based intervention (iWork.COMP) specifically designed to mitigate the impact of toxic leadership styles through the development of compassionate motivation among health care professionals. Following a Randomized Controlled Trial, with 200 participants allocated to either a treatment group (TG) or a waiting-list control group (WLCG), it is hypothesized that the iWork.COMP will reduce the impact of toxic leadership styles, deviant traits and burnout symptoms among the TG when compared with the WLCG. Moreover, we expect that the iWork.COMP will promote wellbeing and a compassionate motivation among the TG when compared with the WLCG.
Official title: The Efficacy of the iWork.COMP Among Health Care Professionals: A Randomized Controlled Trial
Key Details
Gender
All
Age Range
18 Years - Any
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Enrollment
200
Start Date
2026-06-01
Completion Date
2028-05-30
Last Updated
2025-06-27
Healthy Volunteers
Yes
Conditions
Interventions
iWork.Comp
The iWork.COMP is a short-term and low-time consuming internet delivery CFT-based intervention specifically designed to mitigate the impact of toxic leadership styles through the development of compassionate motivation in the workforce of EU hospitals. The iWork.COMP encompasses 8 individual sessions (20 minutes each; mixed format including text, audio and video presentations), which will be available weekly for participants at the KEEPCARING website (https://keepcaring.eu). Each session has three parts. Part 1 encompasses a brief check-in on the stress level of the participant at that moment and on the source of their stress (if applicable). In Part 2, the theme of the session is developed. Finally, Part 3 encompasses a brief check-in on the stress level of the participant at the end of the session and on the usefulness of the session; an optional open question to provide feedback will also be displayed.
Locations (1)
Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences of the University of Coimbra
Coimbra, Portugal