Empathy is undergoing an evolution. In a global and interconnected culture, empathy and compassion must be extended to people of all backgrounds and identities, including patients, our colleagues and the communities we serve. The human capacity for empathy is vast but is also subject to change. Empathetics was founded with a mission to expand empathy and compassion by teaching individuals and teams how to understand, appreciate and respond to the perspectives and emotions of others.
As we have learned from extensive research, the capacity for empathy is not merely an innate trait—it is also a skill that can be learned and expanded. Empathetics offers evidence-based educational tools and skills to build both individual and team empathic capacities to create authentic emotional connection with others in every healthcare encounter and beyond.
Welcome to Empathetics!
Helen Riess, M.D. at TEDxMiddlebury

Dr. Riess is Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Empathetics, Inc. She is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Her research on empathy and the neuroscience of emotions has been published in peer reviewed journals. She is a core member of the Research Consortium for Emotional Intelligence (CREIO) and is also a faculty member of the Harvard Macy Institute.
More than 80% of malpractice claims are the result of communication failures and the likelihood of an unhappy outcome is correlated with low physician empathy. (Hickson, 2002; Levinson, 2004)
43% of nurses show signs of burnout. (Aiken LH, Clarke SP, Sloane DM, Sochalski J, Silber JH. Hospital Nurse Staffing and Patient Mortality, Nurse Burnout, and Job Dissatisfaction. JAMA. 2002;288(16):1987-1993. doi:10.1001/jama.288.16.1987).
Compared to the general population, male and female physicians are 48% and 130%, respectively, more likely to suffer from depression leading to suicide. (Schernhammer 2005).
Patients receiving written information could better recall potential complications of surgery (94% vs. 69%) and better recalled where to obtain additional information (68% vs. 31%.) (Shenouda et al., 2014)
56% of physicians said they lacked the time to be empathic, and 29% reported burn-out as the primary reason for their difficulty in being empathic.