Effect of Practitioner Self-Care and Anxiety on Relationships within the Context of Organizational Change

The purpose of this research paper is to review the literature and suggest the relationships between organizational change through implementation of new health information technology (HIT) and/or reconfiguration of existing HIT, practitioner anxiety, and effective caring practitioner/patient and practitioner/practitioner relationships using a conceptual framework of Relationship Centered Care (RCC). Engaging in frequent and regular self-care interventions has been shown to be related to practitioner/patient caring ability and caring efficacy. According to a published model of RCC, it may be anticipated that selfcare may decrease practitioner anxiety in the context of organizational change and increase ability of the practitioner to engage in effective caring relationships with patients and other practitioners. Through the lens of RCC and within the context of organizational changes such as implementing HIT, a conceptual model for research is proposed, research questions and hypotheses are stated, and methodology for a future stream of research is briefly discussed.