Mental health experiences of healthcare professionals during COVID-19

Abstract

Orientation: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic led to fundamental changes in the workplace for many, particularly healthcare workers.Research purpose: This study explored healthcare workers’ (ophthalmologists, nurses and support staff) experiences of anxiety, depression, burnout, resilience and coping strategies during lockdown Levels 2 and 3 in an Ophthalmic consulting practice and hospital in South Africa.Motivation for the study: The increased workplace stress and vulnerability associated with working during the COVID-19 pandemic introduced an unprecedented level of risk for healthcare workers. Factors contributing to psychological distress must be identified and appropriately mitigated, to prevent dire human and economic costs.Research approach/design and method: A survey was sent out at two separate times to a convenience sample of 31 and 15 healthcare workers respectively. The survey consisted of a demographics section, Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, Burnout Measure short-version, Brief Cope Inventory, Connor Davidson Resilience Inventory and six open-ended questions investigating personal health and support experiences during COVID-19. Descriptive analyses and thematic analysis were used for data analysis.Main findings: The sample of healthcare workers experienced some degree of psychological distress, including anxiety, burnout and a lack of social support on both surveys. However, these symptoms were alleviated by personal factors, including positive coping mechanisms, high resilience and organisational support.Practical/managerial implications: Healthcare facilities should consider in-house structures focusing on building resilience and positive coping mechanisms, whilst ensuring that workplace conditions are optimal for staff members.Contribution/value-add: This study provides some insight into both the risk and protective factors experienced by health workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Bibliometric visualisation of industrial and organisational psychology during COVID-19 pandemic: Insight for future research

“…The prominent mental health problems experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic are acute stress disorder, anxiety and depression, with chest pain, physical exhaustion and sleep disturbance as common symptoms (Van Roekel, Van Der Fels, Bakker, & Tummers, 2021 ; Wang et al, 2021 ; Yang et al, 2021 ). There are several risk factors identified: (1) social connectivity, including social support (Gloster et al, 2020 ; Ye et al, 2020 ) and lower-level communication with friends (Tahara, Mashizume, & Takahashi, 2020 ); (2) demographic factors, including education level (Gloster et al, 2020 ), female gender (Prati, 2021 ) and employment status (Nam, Eum, Huh, Jung, & Choi, 2021 ); (3) personal factors, including self-compassion (Kotera, Mayer, & Vanderheiden, 2021 ), personality traits and coping (Cook, Hassem, Laher, Variava, & Schutte, 2021 ; Osimo, Aiello, Gentili, Ionta, & Cecchetto, 2021 ; Smith et al, 2021 ), resilience (Cook et al, 2021 ), work satisfaction (Tahara et al, 2020 ) and work engagement (Kotera et al, 2021 ); (4) environment and work factors, including high-risk working area (Ruiz-Fernández et al, 2020 ), work stressor (Hu, Dai, Wang, Zhang, Li, & He, 2021 ), work responsibility (Parthasarathy, Jaisoorya, Thennarasu, & Murthy, 2021 ), work hour (Britt et al, 2020 ) and organisational support (Cook et al, 2021 ). These mental health problems will interfere with long-term health conditions (Zara, Settanni, Zuffranieri, Veggi, & Castelli, 2021 ) and work functioning (Fu, Greco, Lennard, & Dimotakis, 2021 ).…”

“…Regarding the conditions, providing mental health programmes for health care workers is urgently needed, both as preventive and curative action (Crittenden, Spieker, & Landini, 2021 ; Yang et al, 2021 ). Besides developing internal ability programmes such as increasing self-efficacy (Vagni et al, 2020 ), resiliency (Kelly, Uys, Bezuidenhout, Mullane, & Bristol, 2021 ), effective appraisal and coping (Cook et al, 2021 ; Ji, Han, Deng, & Lu, 2021 ; Pearman, Hughes, Smith, & Neupert, 2020 ), it is essential to provide social support (Husted & Dalton, 2021 ; Ji et al, 2021 ) and health service such as telecounselling that may feasibly improve mental health conditions (Gupta et al, 2021 ).…”

“…The population experienced an increase in several mental health problems during the COVID-19 pandemic, ranging from personal symptoms to symptoms related to performance and the environment, such as doubting knowledge and skills and feeling uncomfortable within the team (Vanhaecht et al, 2021). (Britt et al, 2020) and organisational support (Cook et al, 2021). These mental health problems will interfere with long-term health conditions (Zara, Settanni, Zuffranieri, Veggi, & Castelli, 2021) and work functioning (Fu, Greco, Lennard, & Dimotakis, 2021).…”

Vulnerability of South African women workers in the COVID-19 pandemic

“…Those women who continued to go to work had to work longer hours when colleagues contracted COVID-19. Health care workers in particular started to experience burnout owing to stressful conditions, the longer hours and reduced timeoff they faced during the pandemic (18). The experiences of healthcare workers during the pandemic in South Africa are similar to that of healthcare workers the globally (19)(20)(21).…”

Satisfacción Laboral en Auxiliares de Enfermería

“…Este es considerado parte esencial en la lucha contra la pandemia por el rol de cuidado permanente que prestan a los usuarios, lo cual los exponen a mayores desafíos. Así que, por un lado, proteger su bienestar es una acción crucial para la respuesta acertada y eficiente ante la emergencia de salud pública, y, por otro, para garantizar la calidad en la prestación del servicio de salud (Cook et al, 2021).…”