At Galen College of Nursing, Compassionate Care isn’t just a buzzword. It’s the foundation of our school.

Compassionate care is woven into our academic curriculum at every step of a nursing student’s journey, from meeting with admissions officers, going to lectures and attending clinicals on-site, and crossing the stage at graduation. From the front desk staff all the way up to the CEO, Galen employees are intentional about approaching all interactions with compassion, modeling the behavior to help our students.

And if we can change the life of one student, they can change the lives of many.

The American Association of Colleges of Nursing defines compassionate care simply as, ‘having empathy or real concern for patients, coupled with a desire to take action to address the patient’s need’. As a caregiver, let alone a registered nurse, it can be easy to get caught up in all the tasks needed to do, frustration with the patient’s condition, and more, which can lead a caregiver losing their compassion.

This is why compassion is considered a core value in nursing. Without it, it’s impossible to adequately treat a patient to feel their best.

Different research papers have called compassionate care, ‘an essential feature of quality care’ and ‘critical to nursing and nursing education.’

“(Compassionate care) is not simply about treating a condition,” Galen College of Nursing President Tracy Ortelli, PhD, RN, CNE, ANEF, FAAN, said. “It is about recognizing the person behind the diagnosis, understanding their lived experiences, and meeting them with dignity, empathy, and respect.”

At Galen, we take compassionate care very seriously. So seriously, that we created a new position a few years ago, Senior Director, Compassionate Care Integration, and hired experienced nurse Lori Brodie, DNP, PhD, PMHNP-BC to the role in March 2023.

“The role was created really because (Galen CEO and Co-Founder) Mark Vogt wanted compassion to be a continued focus for nursing,” Brodie said.

Brodie’s first task in the new job was creating Galen’s Compassionate Care model, our ICARE values.

Inclusivity: I foster an environment that provides opportunity for every individual to reach their full potential.
Character: I act with integrity and compassion in all I do.
Accountability: I own my role and accept responsibility for my actions.
Respect: I value every person as an individual with unique contributions worthy of consideration.
Excellence: I commit myself to the highest level of quality in everything I do.

From there, she trained around 1,000 Galen employees in 1-hour Zoom sessions on bringing compassionate care to work and the classroom every day.

“I think I did 26 (Zoom sessions) in 90 days,” Brodie said. “It was incredible. It was some long weeks but it was great. I felt, and I pushed Cabinet that if we’re going to teach this to our students, we all need to know about it and we all need to be able to model compassionate care whether we’re in registration, financial services, or in faculty. We can’t ask the students to do something we’re not willing to do themselves.”

In 2024, Brodie began working on curriculum integration with faculty members across the nation. This can include teaching students about empathetic communication with patients depending on their condition, or learning about how different cultures experience and tolerate pain.

As of September 2025, 58% of the courses in the college have some compassionate care content, and the goal, Brodie says, is to have 100% integration by the end of 2026.

“It is a tremendous, intensive, intention undertaking and I’m excited about it,” Brodie said. “I can’t wait until we have it all and then we can track students who have received compassionate care curriculum from Galen Pathway to Success (GPS) to graduation.”

One area of nursing that can sometimes be overlooked by accident is how cultural norms fit in to healthcare. Depending on a person’s background, it can change how they feel or react to the care that is presented to them.

For example, in some cultures, some men don’t feel comfortable being treated by a woman, and vice versa. Additionally, as mentioned above, there are some cultures where it is seen as a sign of weakness to show pain, so it could make it more difficult for nurses to find out how the patient is feeling if they are not disclosing how bad they feel.

This is where emotional intelligence is needed. Emotional intelligence is a core component of compassionate care, and it allows a nurse to be self-aware, ask questions, and bring compassion and empathy into all interactions.

“Since I have initially worked on the floor, there’s a couple of instances where I’m treating a female patient and they requested a female nurse, and there’s been a couple of instances where they prefer a male nurse,” Galen graduate and LewisGale Hospital in Roanoke, Va. registered nurse Deonte Dance said. “One thing that Galen taught us is that you have to be willing to set all of your biases aside, because if you try to become a nurse and you provide care, and you hang on to your biases, you’re not going to be able to provide efficient care. Whether it’s a male vs. female, another ethnicity, etc…you have to be willing to set that aside. If you can’t separate what you believe vs. what the patient believes, you won’t be able to provide efficient care.”

At Galen, students have many opportunities to put the ICARE values into action. Whether it’s practicing on a mannequin in a simulation lab on a Galen campus, or interacting with a patient while on clinicals in a healthcare facility, students can apply the lessons they’ve learned and get feedback on their interactions.

In our clinical learning labs, students take the hand-on skills they learned in lectures and can apply it to mannequins with a faculty instructor by their side. This can include everything from talking with patients to find out what’s bothering them, inserting IVs, and changing bedsheets.

In the next step, students head to our simulation lab where they have a true one-on-one experience, like registered nurses do with their patients. Students receive a ‘report’ on a patient, and the students model the behavior of an RN in a unit. Faculty members observe and can control how the ‘patient’ behaves with the student depending on the decisions the student makes during a guided scenario.

It gives the student a real-world view into nurse-to-patient interactions, as well as gives them the opportunity to practice compassionate care techniques before heading to a clinical setting.

“In the scenarios we’re able to give specific examples – stories – where we are ensuring that the holistic care is taken into account,” Galen Associate Vice President of Culture and Engagement Carla McKenzie, PhD, MSN, RN, said. “It ensures this belonging and inclusion because we’re constantly reminding students of the holistic view of a patient. It’s an individual and goes beyond a patient number or a student ID, who is this individual and what do they need. Both at the bedside and away with the bedside. It’s how we interact with patients and with students. No body wants to be lumped in to a category, everybody wants individualized and personalized care. Inclusivity requires seeing the individual, not the group or a category of people.”

Galen’s Compassionate Care model sets us apart from other nursing schools. If you’re interested channeling your compassion into becoming a nurse, see what Galen can offer you! Galen offers several paths including our: PN/VN diploma program, Associate Degree in Nursing (ADN) program, and 3-year Baccalaureate Degree in Nursing (BSN) program.

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