Free tools for clinicians and students.
Empathy in Medicine Initiative is a nonprofit. We make the cards, scripts, and prompts that help empathy habits stick.
A handful of small habits, repeated, between two people in a room. That is the whole project.
Three commitments we keep, quietly, every day.
Human-centered care
Patients leave the room feeling heard, understood, and respected.
Empathy scripts, teach-back prompts, agenda-setting cards. Things a clinician picks up between two patients and uses the next time they walk into a room. No curriculum redesign, no new platform, no extra time inside a 15-minute appointment.
Practical tools
Ready-to-use cards that fit real clinical workflows without adding time.
Printable cards, pocket references, low-ink versions, copy-paste EHR snippets, setting-specific kits for primary care, ED, pediatrics, and telehealth. Plus short micro-trainings staff can do on a break.
Privacy-first
Built for local use. No patient data ever touches our servers.
We collect anonymous, organization-level counts only (“Hospital X downloaded 50 toolkits”). No names, no MRNs, no PHI ever pass through our platform.
What these tools are, and what they aren’t.
We’re a small nonprofit, not a clinical decision support vendor. Here’s where we draw the line, plainly.
Not medical advice
These tools support communication, not clinical decision-making.
No patient data
All tools designed for local, compliant use without patient identifiers.
No affiliation
Organizations are responsible for local compliance.
Who works with us.
We keep two public lists. One names the clinics and groups. The other names individual people.
Partners
Clinics, chapters, and organizations that use EIMI tools with their own patients or students.
Ambassadors
Individual people who represent EIMI at one school, clinic, or community.
Pick one card. Try it tomorrow.
Free tools, short trainings, and a handful of starter kits. All downloadable, all printable, all yours.
The people steering the work.
A small, deliberately lean team. Three roles, clear lanes, a few hours a week each. Enough to move EIMI without meetings filling the calendar.
Executive Director or President
FilledLeads the Empathy in Medicine Initiative and sets the direction for growth, credibility, and impact. Owns the mission and brand voice. Approves the highest value partnerships and keeps the organization focused on outcomes, not busywork. Makes final calls when there is ambiguity. Maintains a clear public facing standard for what EIMI is and what it is not.
- Set quarterly priorities and non-negotiable standards
- Approve major partnerships, public collaborations, and chapter policy
- Review core metrics weekly and remove bottlenecks
- Ensure messaging stays aligned with the mission and does not drift
- Represent EIMI in high level communications when needed
- Decide escalation cases from chapters or partners
- Strong written communication and professional judgment
- Consistent execution and fast decision making
- Comfortable leading a small team asynchronously
- Able to dedicate 2 to 4 hours per week minimum
- Responds within 48 hours for high priority items
- Can uphold boundaries, including no medical advice and no patient data collection
Operations and Chapters Director
Runs the internal systems and the chapter network so EIMI scales without constant meetings. Owns chapter onboarding, approvals, the starter kit, and the reporting cadence. Makes sure chapters and ambassadors stay active, submit updates on time, and have everything they need to execute independently.
- Approve and onboard new chapters using a clear checklist
- Maintain the Chapter Starter Kit, meeting agendas, and launch steps
- Set up and maintain workflows, templates, and automations
- Track chapter status: active, pending report, inactive
- Follow up with chapter leads who miss reporting deadlines
- Enforce lightweight standards for remaining an active chapter
- Route complex issues to the Executive Director
- Extremely organized and reliable
- Strong email and follow up skills
- Comfortable with systems like Notion or Airtable and Google tools
- Willing to enforce deadlines politely and consistently
- Able to dedicate 3 to 6 hours per week
- Responds within 48 hours
Partnerships, Growth and Community Director
Owns external growth end to end. Builds partnerships with clinics, hospitals, schools, universities, nonprofits, and professional organizations. Runs a scalable outreach pipeline and manages community growth with minimal overhead. Onboards and manages volunteers and ambassadors, keeps them active, and follows up when updates are late.
- Build and run an outreach pipeline for schools and clinical partners
- Establish and maintain partnerships with hospitals, clinics, universities, nonprofits, and professional organizations
- Send outreach messages, follow ups, and route interested leads
- Manage ambassadors, including onboarding and task assignment
- Track ambassador status: active, pending report, dormant
- Follow up with non-reporters and keep people accountable
- Coordinate collaborations and distribution opportunities
- Maintain a simple weekly progress report and pipeline tracker
- Strong professional writing and relationship building
- Comfortable with cold outreach and follow ups
- Organized and able to manage pipelines at scale
- Can coordinate content creators or partners when needed
- Able to dedicate 3 to 6 hours per week
- Responds within 48 hours
The people who represent EIMI.
Board members carry the work into their own countries and communities, and help decide where EIMI goes next.
Kevin Lin
President | Global Board
Gwendolyn Tangog
Chapter Lead | Global BoardGwendolyn is an IB Diploma Programme student in Grade 11 and a member of the Global Board of the Empathy in Medicine Initiative. She built an active and growing EIMI Chapter in Metro Manila, focused on practising and teaching empathy skills and on giving to vulnerable groups.
Inspired by the Initiative’s mission, she plans to become a child and adolescent psychiatrist whose patients feel heard and cared for. Outside EIMI she runs a self-started annual workshop that helps preschool students become more emotionally aware and responsible, has run an educational workshop for informal settlers affected by poverty where she donated self-curated items, and has researched childhood stunting and its cognitive effects on learning for Filipino children.
Mariana
Ambassador | Global BoardMariana is a rising senior from Michigan with a passion for medicine and for serving others. She believes empathy and kindness are among the most powerful forms of medicine, and she plans to carry those values into her career, whether as a surgeon or wherever medicine takes her.
Outside school she advocates for what she believes in through debate, and she spends her time with her two cats, Mazzy and Baby, and her dog, Dexter.
Interested in a role?
Tell us a little about you. We read every message, and we reply within 48 hours.
Evidence briefs.
Every card we publish traces back to a peer-reviewed paper. Four briefs below summarize the studies we lean on most, with citations, methods, and DOIs.
What the studies show
30%
fewer readmissions within 30 daysSchillinger 2003
3×
lower malpractice claimsHojat 2011
18%
empathy score improvement at 3-month follow-upBatt-Rawden 2013
45%
fewer medication errors with teach-backSchillinger 2003
12%
shorter visits with upfront agenda-settingMarvel 1999
2×
higher medication adherence at 6 monthsHojat 2011
Teach-back improves understanding and reduces readmissions
In the teach-back method, clinicians ask patients to explain their understanding in their own words. It significantly improves comprehension of discharge instructions and medication adherence.
Key findings
- Patients who received teach-back had 30% fewer readmissions within 30 days
- Medication errors decreased by 45% when teach-back was used for new prescriptions
- Patient satisfaction scores improved by 23% in clinics using systematic teach-back
Methodology
Randomized controlled trial with 408 patients discharged from internal medicine services. The intervention group received teach-back at discharge. The control group received standard instructions.
Primary sources
Schillinger D, Piette J, Grumbach K, et al.
“Closing the loop: Physician communication with diabetic patients who have low health literacy”
Archives of Internal Medicine, 2003
DOI: 10.1001/archinte.163.1.83Peter D, Robinson P, Jordan M, et al.
“Reducing readmissions using teach-back: Enhancing patient and family education”
Journal of Nursing Administration, 2015
DOI: 10.1097/NNA.0000000000000177Agenda-setting at visit start improves alignment and satisfaction
When clinicians ask patients about their priorities at the start of a visit, both sides report higher satisfaction and better visit outcomes. The alternative is assuming those concerns, or discovering them late.
Key findings
- Visits with upfront agenda-setting were 12% shorter on average
- Patients were 40% less likely to bring up new concerns in the final 2 minutes
- Clinician burnout scores decreased when using structured agenda-setting
Methodology
Analysis of 264 audio-recorded primary care visits. Visits were coded for agenda-setting behavior and correlated with post-visit satisfaction surveys from both patients and clinicians.
Primary sources
Marvel MK, Epstein RM, Flowers K, Beckman HB
“Soliciting the patient's agenda: Have we improved?”
JAMA, 1999
DOI: 10.1001/jama.281.3.283Rodriguez HP, Anastario MP, Frankel RM, et al.
“Can teaching agenda-setting skills to physicians improve clinical interaction quality?”
BMC Medical Education, 2008
DOI: 10.1186/1472-6920-8-3Empathic communication builds trust and improves outcomes
Patient perception of clinician empathy is strongly correlated with treatment adherence, symptom improvement, and overall health outcomes. This effect is independent of the actual treatment provided.
Key findings
- Patients of high-empathy physicians had 9% better HbA1c control in diabetes
- Perceived empathy predicted 2x higher medication adherence at 6 months
- Malpractice claims were 3x lower for physicians rated as empathetic
Methodology
Prospective cohort study of 891 diabetic patients across 29 physicians. Empathy was measured using the Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy (patient-reported version).
Primary sources
Hojat M, Louis DZ, Markham FW, et al.
“Physicians' empathy and clinical outcomes for diabetic patients”
Academic Medicine, 2011
DOI: 10.1097/ACM.0b013e3182086fe1Kelley JM, Kraft-Todd G, Schapira L, et al.
“The influence of the patient-clinician relationship on healthcare outcomes”
PLoS One, 2014
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0094207Communication training can be brief and still effective
Empathy training is assumed to need a large time investment. It does not. Brief, focused sessions, some as short as 60 minutes, produce measurable improvements in communication behavior.
Key findings
- 60-minute training sessions improved empathy scores by 18% at 3-month follow-up
- Micro-training (10-minute modules) showed comparable results to full-day workshops
- Video-based self-assessment was as effective as in-person coaching
Methodology
Meta-analysis of 18 randomized controlled trials comparing various empathy training formats, totaling 2,847 healthcare professional participants.
Primary sources
Batt-Rawden SA, Chisolm MS, Anton B, Flickinger TE
“Teaching empathy to medical students: An updated, systematic review”
Academic Medicine, 2013
DOI: 10.1097/ACM.0b013e318299f3e3Riess H, Kelley JM, Bailey RW, et al.
“Empathy training for resident physicians”
Journal of General Internal Medicine, 2012
DOI: 10.1007/s11606-012-2063-zSuggest a study
Know of research we should include? Send us the citation and we’ll read it.
Write to us.
Send questions, feedback, press inquiries, or research you think we should read. We reply within 48 hours.
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