Navigating the Covid-19 Pandemic by Caring for Our Health Care Workforce as They Care for Our Patients

FrushKaren,; LeeGrace,; WaldSamuel, H; HawnMary,; KrnaCatherine,; HolubarMarisa,; BeattyDale,; ChawlaAmanda,; PinskyBenjamin, A; SchillingLisa,; MaldonadoYvonne,

doi:10.1056/cat.20.0378

Cited by 12 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 17 publications

(8 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The unifying urgency for support underlying the sentiments of our focus group participants was most resounding, regardless of the specific needs identified by respondents. Increasingly, institutions and organizations are starting to share their best practices as it pertains to occupational safety and at-risk faculty [59,62].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

COVID-19’s impact on faculty and staff at a School of Medicine in the US: what is the blueprint for the future?

Gottenborg

Naderi

et al. 2021

BMC Health Serv Res

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused unprecedented challenges within medical centers, revealing inequities embedded in the medical community and exposing fragile social support systems. While faculty and staff faced extraordinary demands in workplace duties, personal responsibilities also increased. The goal of this study was to understand the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on personal and professional activities of faculty and staff in order to illuminate current challenges and explore solutions. Methods Qualitative, semi-structured group interviews involved faculty and staff at four affiliate sites within the Department of Medicine at the University of Colorado, School of Medicine. Focus groups addressed the impact of COVID-19 on (1) Changes to roles and responsibilities at work and at home, (2) Resources utilized to manage these changes and, (3) Potential strategies for how the Department could assist faculty and staff. Thematic analysis was conducted using an inductive method at the semantic level to form themes and subthemes. Results Qualitative analysis of focus group transcripts revealed themes of: (1) Challenges and disparities experienced during the pandemic, (2) Disproportionate impact on women personally and professionally, (3) Institutional factors that contributed to wellness and burnout, and (4) Solutions and strategies to support faculty and staff. Within each of these themes were multiple subthemes including increased professional and personal demands, concern for personal safety, a sense of internal guilt, financial uncertainty, missed professional opportunities, and a negative impact on mentoring. Solutions were offered and included an emphasis on addressing preexisting inequities, the importance of community, and workplace flexibility. Conclusions The COVID-19 pandemic created burdens for already challenged faculty and staff in both their personal and professional lives. Swift action and advocacy by academic institutions is needed to support the lives and careers of our colleagues now and in the future.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

COVID-19’s impact on faculty and staff at a School of Medicine in the US: what is the blueprint for the future?

Gottenborg

Naderi

et al. 2021

BMC Health Serv Res

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…-Promoting the health and well-being of health care providers: healthy health care providers are an essential condition for the provision of quality care and services to patients and the population (138). The crisis has shown that their health has often been taken for granted by decision-makers and managers, rather than as a priority requiring well-defined and coherent strategies and actions (139). It is necessary to ensure that the conditions are met to protect them, both in a context of crisis and in routine practice: occupational health and psychological support services; availability of materials and equipment for quality clinical practice; volume and workflow adapted to the complexity of clinical practice, performance criteria freed from a "business" logic; policy that prevents excesses in terms of holiday deprivation and imposed overtime; organizational governance and leadership that reinforce collaboration, trust and transparent communication between professionals and hierarchy.…”

Section: Recommendations and Avenues For Policy And Practicementioning

confidence: 99%

How Can Health Systems Better Prepare for the Next Pandemic? Lessons Learned From the Management of COVID-19 in Quebec (Canada)

Alami

Lehoux

Fleet

et al. 2021

Front. Public Health

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The magnitude of the COVID-19 pandemic challenged societies around our globalized world. To contain the spread of the virus, unprecedented and drastic measures and policies were put in place by governments to manage an exceptional health care situation while maintaining other essential services. The responses of many governments showed a lack of preparedness to face this systemic and global health crisis. Drawing on field observations and available data on the first wave of the pandemic (mid-March to mid-May 2020) in Quebec (Canada), this article reviewed and discussed the successes and failures that characterized the management of COVID-19 in this province. Using the framework of Palagyi et al. on system preparedness toward emerging infectious diseases, we described and analyzed in a chronologically and narratively way: (1) how surveillance was structured; (2) how workforce issues were managed; (3) what infrastructures and medical supplies were made available; (4) what communication mechanisms were put in place; (5) what form of governance emerged; and (6) whether trust was established and maintained throughout the crisis. Our findings and observations stress that resilience and ability to adequately respond to a systemic and global crisis depend upon preexisting system-level characteristics and capacities at both the provincial and federal governance levels. By providing recommendations for policy and practice from a learning health system perspective, this paper contributes to the groundwork required for interdisciplinary research and genuine policy discussions to help health systems better prepare for future pandemics.

show abstract

“…The COVID-19 pandemic has caused an enormous burden on the health care system and health care delivery worldwide [1][2][3][4]. As social distancing and quarantining became the new normal, face-to-face clinical visits plummeted, causing the health care system to rapidly shift to telemedicine to leverage their response to the pandemic [5][6][7][8]. Telemedicine created new opportunities for patient care in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and thus reduced health care disparities [9,10].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Physicians’ Attitudes Toward Telemedicine Consultations During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Cross-sectional Study

Alhajri¹,

Simsekler²,

Alfalasi³

et al. 2021

JMIR Med Inform

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background To mitigate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, health care systems worldwide have implemented telemedicine technologies to respond to the growing need for health care services during these unprecedented times. In the United Arab Emirates, video and audio consultations have been implemented to deliver health services during the pandemic. Objective This study aimed to evaluate whether differences exist in physicians’ attitudes and perceptions of video and audio consultations when delivering telemedicine services during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods This survey was conducted on a cohort of 880 physicians from outpatient facilities in Abu Dhabi, which delivered telemedicine services during the COVID-19 pandemic between November and December 2020. In total, 623 physicians responded (response rate=70.8%). The survey included a 5-point Likert scale to measure physician’s attitudes and perceptions of video and audio consultations with reference to the quality of the clinical consultation and the professional productivity. Descriptive statistics were used to describe physicians’ sociodemographic characteristics (age, sex, designation, clinical specialty, duration of practice, and previous experience with telemedicine) and telemedicine modality (video vs audio consultations). Regression models were used to assess the association between telemedicine modality and physicians’ characteristics with the perceived outcomes of the web-based consultation. Results Compared to audio consultations, video consultations were significantly associated with physicians’ confidence toward managing acute consultations (odds ratio [OR] 1.62, 95% CI 1.2-2.21; P=.002) and an increased ability to provide patient education during the web-based consultation (OR 2.21, 95% CI 1.04-4.33; P=.04). There was no significant difference in physicians’ confidence toward managing long-term and follow-up consultations through video or audio consultations (OR 1.35, 95% CI 0.88-2.08; P=.17). Video consultations were less likely to be associated with a reduced overall consultation time (OR 0.69, 95% CI 0.51-0.93; P=.02) and reduced time for patient note-taking compared to face-to-face visits (OR 0.48, 95% CI 0.36-0.65; P<.001). Previous experience with telemedicine was significantly associated with a lower perceived risk of misdiagnosis (OR 0.46, 95% CI 0.3-0.71; P<.001) and an enhanced physician-patient rapport (OR 2.49, 95% CI 1.26-4.9; P=.008). Conclusions These results indicate that video consultations should be adopted frequently in the new remote clinical consultations. Previous experience with telemedicine was associated with a 2-fold confidence in treating acute conditions, less than a half of the perceived risk of misdiagnosis, and an increased ability to provide patients with health education and enhance the physician-patient rapport. Additionally, these results show that audio consultations are equivalent to video consultations in providing remote follow-up care to patients with chronic conditions. These findings may be beneficial to policymakers of e-health programs in low- and middle-income countries, where audio consultations may significantly increase access to geographically remote health services.

show abstract

Navigating the Covid-19 Pandemic by Caring for Our Health Care Workforce as They Care for Our Patients

Abstract: When Santa Clara County in California was identified as an early coronavirus hot spot and health care workers as one of two at-risk populations, it became clear to leaders at Stanford Medicine that their approach would need to prioritize care for those who care for their patients.

Cited by 12 publications

References 17 publications

COVID-19’s impact on faculty and staff at a School of Medicine in the US: what is the blueprint for the future?

COVID-19’s impact on faculty and staff at a School of Medicine in the US: what is the blueprint for the future?

How Can Health Systems Better Prepare for the Next Pandemic? Lessons Learned From the Management of COVID-19 in Quebec (Canada)

Physicians’ Attitudes Toward Telemedicine Consultations During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Cross-sectional Study

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About