This study aimed to investigate the perceived work stress and its influencing factors among hospital staff during the novel coronavirus (COVID‐19) pandemic in Taiwan. A web‐based survey was conducted at one medical center and two regional hospitals in southern Taiwan, targeting physicians, nurses, medical examiners, and administrators. The questionnaire included items on the demographic characteristics of hospital staff and a scale to assess stress among healthcare workers caring for patients with a highly infectious disease. A total of 752 valid questionnaires were collected. The hospital staff reported a moderate level of stress and nurses had a highest level of stress compared to staff in the other three occupational categories. The five highest stress scores were observed for the items “rough and cracked hands due to frequent hand washing and disinfectant use,” “inconvenience in using the toilet at work,” “restrictions on eating and drinking at work,” “fear of transmitting the disease to relatives and friends,” and “fear of being infected with COVID‐19.” Discomfort caused by protective equipment was the major stressor for the participants, followed by burden of caring for patients. Among participants who experienced severe stress (n = 129), work stress was higher among those with rather than without minor children. The present findings may serve as a reference for future monitoring of hospital staff's workload, and may aid the provision of support and interventions.

This study aimed to identify factors that significantly affect the behavioral intention of nursing staff to practice telenursing, applying the decomposed theory of planned behavior (DTPB) as the research framework. This cross-sectional survey study collected data from a valid sample of 203 responses from nurses from a regional hospital in Taipei City, Taiwan. The results of data analysis showed that nursing staff’s attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control toward telenursing correlated positively with behavioral intention to participate in telenursing. Decomposing the main concepts identified two significant predictive determinants that influence nurses’ behavioral intentions: (a) facilitating conditions (β = 0.394, t = 5.817, p = 0.000 < 0.001) and (b) supervisor influence (β= 0.232, t = 3.431, p = 0.001 < 0.01), which together explain 28.6% of the variance for behavioral intention. The results of this study indicated that support and encouragement from nursing supervisors are important factors affecting nurses’ intention to practice telenursing. Education and training, health policies advocacy and the provision of adequate facilitating technologies and recourses are important factors for improving intention to practice telenursing.

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BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic has instilled fear and stress among healthcare workers. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to assess work stress and associated factors among healthcare workers during the COVID-19 outbreak and to evaluate whether prior experience of treating severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) had a positive or negative influence on healthcare workers' stress levels during the COVID-19 pandemic. DESIGN AND SETTING: Cross-sectional survey in a tertiary hospital in Kaohsiung City, in southern Taiwan. METHODS: The survey was conducted using an online self-administered questionnaire to measure the stress levels among healthcare workers from March 20 to April 20, 2020. The stress scales were divided into four subscales: worry of social isolation; discomfort caused by the protective equipment; difficulties and anxiety regarding infection control; and workload of caring for patients. RESULTS: The total stress scores were significantly higher among healthcare workers who were aged 41 or above, female, married, parents and nurses. Those with experience of treating SARS reported having significantly higher stress scores on the subscale measuring the discomfort caused by protective equipment and the workload of caring for patients. During the COVID-19 outbreak, frontline healthcare workers with experience of treating SARS indicated having higher stress levels regarding the workload of caring for patients than did non-frontline healthcare workers with no experience of treating SARS. CONCLUSIONS: Work experience from dealing with the 2003 SARS virus may have had a negative psychological impact on healthcare workers amidst the COVID-19 outbreak.

BackgroundFew researches have explored the self-regulation process in patients with extremity injuries. Knowledge about the role of coping in the postinjury self-regulation process remains scarce.ObjectivesWe examined the relationships between illness representations, coping, and quality of life (QoL) based on the self-regulation framework, assuming adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies play mediating roles between illness representation and QoL in patients with extremity injuries.MethodsA cross-sectional survey with a correlational model testing design was used. A sample of 192 patients with extremity injury was recruited before hospital discharge at trauma centers in Indonesia. Validated questionnaires were used to assess patients’ illness representations, coping, and QoL. Hierarchical regressions were carried out, and multiple mediation analyses were used to identify the mediating role of coping.ResultsPatients with extremity injuries who harbored negative illness representations were less focused on using adaptive coping strategies, were more focused on using maladaptive coping strategies, and tended to experience reduced QoL. The mediating effects of coping, which manifested as parallel mediations of adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies, could significantly explain the QoL variance.DiscussionIn postinjury self-regulation, coping has a parallel mediating role that can facilitate the effect of illness representations and directly influence postinjury QoL. Enhancing adaptive coping strategies, reducing maladaptive coping techniques, and reframing negative illness representations during the early recovery phase could improve postinjury QoL. Early screening and preventive efforts using psychologically driven interventions may help redirect patients’ focus toward adaptive coping strategies and reframe their illness representations before they transition back into the community.