Professional quality of life in audiologists and speech language pathologists working in India

The study aimed to investigate professional quality of life as reported by audiologists and speech language pathologists (SLPs) working in India. Questionnaire-based cross-sectional e-mail survey design using the Professional Quality of Life scale (ProQOL) was carried out. The sample consisted of professionals registered under the Indian Speech and Hearing Association. The questionnaire was sent through the personal registered e-mail-id to 500 professionals of which 155 complete responses were obtained. Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the demographic variables. Internal consistency was checked using Cronbach’s alpha. Independent sample t test was used to check the relation of occupation, gender and work setting with the ProQOL subscales. ANOVA and post hoc Tukey HSD was performed to determine the effect of years of experience. A statistically significant difference was found between occupation and secondary traumatic stress (STS) levels and years of work experience and burnout. Post hoc analysis revealed a significant difference between 11 and 20 and more than 21 years of experience. Strong negative correlation between compassion satisfaction and burnout whereas a moderate positive correlation between burnout and STS was observed. The study identifies factors such as occupation type and years of experience have an influence on the professional quality of life.