title: Association of Nurses' Self-Reported Empathy and Mu Suppression with Patients' Satisfaction.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The aim of this study is to explore the association between mu suppression and self-reported empathy in nurses with patients' satisfaction.
  
  
  METHODS
  For this correlational study, 30 male nurses, as well as 30 patients took care by these nurses during the week before data gathering, were selected via accessible and random sampling method, respectively. The tools included Jefferson's Scale of Empathy-health professionals, and patient's satisfaction scale of La Monica-Oberst. Activation of Mirror Neurons System (MNS) was investigated by mu suppression. For this purpose, electroencephalography (EEG) was recorded in three phases: 1) Watching the video of a non-moving hand, 2) Watching the video of a hand being open and closed, and 3) Opening and closing one-self's hand. EEG recordings were analyzed using Matlab R 2014a software. Data were analyzed by Pearson's correlation coefficients and multiple regression analyses.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There was no significant correlation between mu suppression in nurses with nurses' self-reported empathy and patients' satisfaction, however, a significant correlation was found between nurses' self-reported empathy and patients' satisfaction. Regression analysis outcomes showed that nurses' self-reported empathy could predict 18.5% (nearly one fifth) of patients' satisfaction variance while mu suppression did not forecast patients' satisfaction significantly.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These findings suggested that mu rhythm was a good biomarker neither for nurses' self-reported empathy nor for patients' satisfaction. In addition, it was manifested that patients' satisfaction, at least partly, depended on skills that nurses could learn, since showing empathy is highly learnable.
authors.affiliation: Depatment of Clinical Psychology, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
authors.forename: Nasser
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Goodarzi
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
authors.forename: Kamran
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Azma
authors.affiliation: Depatment of Clinical Psychology, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
authors.forename: Ehsan
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Tavakolian
authors.affiliation: Depatment of Clinical Psychology, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
authors.forename: Pedram
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Peyvand
keywords: Mirror neurons; Nurses; Patient satisfaction