When trying to explain to people what compassion looks like  as my PhD supervisor would always ask, it becomes clear that it is something that we do, not something that we just talk about. Competent compassionate care can be measured therefore, by our knowledge and skills that we use when providing nursing care.  The model of competent compassionate care that I have discovered from my own research with service users (Ghisoni 2016) is described  in another blog below.  Here I will apply the model by exploring a blog written about Naomi Feil  the creator of validation therapy (Avadian 2015).  The blog is written about how Naomi provides compassionate care through her excellent communication skills but it could be argued that this is not enough. Yes she is an excellent communicator as we can see by the many video clips of her work on the internet. She is also a very compassionate person who really cares about why a person may be feeling a certain way. Her abilty to develop relationships with people is truly amazing. Her knowledge of their physical and psychological needs may be limited however and she may therefore be limited in how far she can help another person. Her experience of working with older people is vast but  is not that different from other great communicators and compassionate people. Without demonstrating her knowledge, Naomi might fall into the category of incompetent compassionate care. As a competent compassionate carer we need to be able to understand what help a person might need so we can signpost them to get that help. We might also need to understand how the mind or body works so that we can help the person to understand their own distress, and empower them towards managing it.   Being compassionate is good but not good enough for people who need to become health literate in understanding their own needs better. When we can demonstrate that we have actually helped someone to manage their lives better, then we can say that we are competent compassionate carers.