Authors: Mayobhav V. , Gracia Sohkhlet, Prerna Verma, Suprakash Chaudhury, Amitav Banerjee et al. You teach medicine, but are your students losing what makes them healers? This cross-sectional study among 470 Indian medical students reveals a statistically significant decline in empathy as students progress through medical school—with the lowest scores in the final year.
While females consistently scored higher, even they weren't immune to this erosion. Surprisingly, reading fiction or philosophy didn’t influence empathy levels—but watching drama did. Add to that the finding that having close friends predicted better empathy, and you’ve got a call to rethink how we shape our future doctors: Should empathy be taught, protected, or measured?
