Empathy is a keystone of medicine.
It goes beyond sympathy where one has a "feeling or an expression of pity or sorrow for the distress of another." Simply, sympathy is when you feel bad for another because you can IMAGINE how much pain the other person is experiencing.
Empathy, on the other hand, is when you feel bad for the other person because you have truly EXPERIENCED the pain that the patient is experiencing.
Nerve conduction studies are uncomfortable at best, painful at worst for patients. The test involves shocking nerves with electricity to see how well they are working. As Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation doctors, we perform this test often to patients. But, in order to learn how to perform these tests, we practice on each other...over and over again. I won't even mention the needle examination part of the EMG test!
So, during these workshops, young doctors learn much more than just the technical aspects of these examinations.