Prevalence of Moral Injury, Burnout, Anxiety, and Depression in Healthcare Workers 2 Years in to the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

COVID-19 has led to marked increases in healthcare worker distress. Studies of these phenomena are often limited to a particular element of distress or a specific subset of healthcare workers. We administered the Moral Injury Symptom Scale for Healthcare Professionals, Copenhagen Burnout Inventory, Patient Health Questionnaire-9, and Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 via online survey to 17,000 employees of a large academic medical center between December 2021 and February 2022. A total of 1945 participants completed the survey. Across all roles, the prevalence of moral injury, burnout, depression, and anxiety were 40.9%, 35.3%–60.6%, 25.4%, and 24.8%, respectively. Furthermore, 8.1% had been bothered by thoughts that they would be better off dead or of hurting themselves for “several days” or more frequently. Healthcare workers across all roles and practice settings are experiencing unsustainable levels of distress, with 1 in 12 regularly experiencing thoughts of self-harm.

Moral injury and mental health among health-care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic: meta-analysis

“…No studies were identified through reference list review or EThOS. However, we identified one eligible thesis (de Groot, 2021 ), one accepted manuscript in press (Lennon et al, 2023 ), two pre-prints in Google Scholar (Ma et al, 2022 ; Thomas et al, 2023 ), and one eligible thesis in ProQuest Dissertations (Kimble, 2023 ). Additionally, when contacting authors from one eligible article (Morris et al, 2022 ), they shared data from a recently finalised, unpublished study (Morris, 2022 ).…”

“…As our findings raise concerns about HCWs’ mental health in the COVID-19 era, it is essential to underscore that these concerns apply to active HCWs regardless of setting. As society may have moved on from the COVID-19 pandemic, its impact on the mental health of HCWs may persist (Lennon et al, 2023 ). Further studies should investigate in the long term if the relationship between MI and mental health problems increases in different areas of practice.…”