Mental images of nurses regarding COVID‐19: A metaphor study

Abstract

Aim The purpose of this study is to understand the thoughts and perceptions of nurses caring for patients with COVID‐19 diagnosis about the COVID‐19 pandemic. Background The nursing profession, with the basic duty of caring for people, is among the professional groups most affected by COVID‐19. The high rate of transmission of COVID‐19, inadequate numbers of nurses for the increasing case numbers, inadequate personal protective equipment and increases in numbers of deaths negatively affected nurses, as they affected all health professionals. Methods This research is phenomenological research. A parallel mixed design including quantitative and qualitative research methods was used in the research. A sociodemographic data form and metaphor perception related to the COVID‐19 pandemic form were used for data collection. Responses of nurses to the open‐ended metaphor questions were evaluated with descriptive analysis and content analysis using the document investigation method. Results The research was completed with 227 nurses. Most of the nurses were employed in COVID‐19 wards (68.3%), were not diagnosed with COVID‐19 (65.2%) and had not lost any relatives to COVID‐19 (59.0%). It was determined that the answers given by the nurses comprised 151 metaphors collected in eight categories in total. Conclusion The results show that the metaphors mentioned by nurses involve hopelessness. Implications for Nursing Management This study reflects the ideas of nurses who are working with all their might during the COVID‐19 pandemic and reveals the psychological status of the nurses.

Attitudes and experiences related to the deaths of COVID‐19 patients among nursing staff: A qualitative evidence synthesis

“…The selected studies were carried out in the United States (Arnetz et al, 2020; Foli et al, 2021; Naylor et al, 2021; White et al, 2021), Turkey (Durgun et al, 2022; Sezgin et al, 2021), Lebanon (Fawaz & Itani, 2021), Iran (Galehdar et al, 2020; Shamsalinia et al, 2022), Canada (Lapum et al, 2021), the United Kingdom (Montgomery et al, 2021) and China (Xu et al, 2021). Nine out of 12 of the articles analysed nurses' experiences in particular (Arnetz et al, 2020; Durgun et al, 2022; Fawaz & Itani, 2021; Foli et al, 2021; Galehdar et al, 2020; Lapum et al, 2021; Naylor et al, 2021; Sezgin et al, 2021; Xu et al, 2021), while three analysed the experiences of other healthcare professionals, such as physicians, physical therapists and dieticians (Montgomery et al, 2021; Shamsalinia et al, 2022; White et al, 2021).…”

“…The selected studies were carried out in the United States (Arnetz et al, 2020;Foli et al, 2021;Naylor et al, 2021;White et al, 2021), Turkey (Durgun et al, 2022;Sezgin et al, 2021),…”

COVID-19 as a Metaphor: Understanding COVID-19 Through Social Media Users

“…There are several metaphor studies in phenomenological design on various subjects such as education, science, migration, and women's studies [9][10][11][12][13] There are also phenomenological metaphor studies that deal with the perception of COVID-19. 14,15 Collecting Data Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, it has been heavily on the agenda on social media. With the call made on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, the participants voluntarily derived metaphors about COVID-19.…”

Exploring the impact of surface acting on nurse leaders during COVID

“…Although the nation has yet not experienced the health crisis that has almost led to the failure of some health systems, the effect has been significant, prolonged and characterised by extreme uncertainty. Nurses have borne the brunt of this onslaught (Durgun et al. , 2021), and the term “the year of the Nurse” has come to epitomise 2021 (Zolnierczyk-Zreda, 2021).…”