Resilience of frontline nurses during the COVID pandemic in China: A qualitative study

Abstract

The aim of this study was to describe the resilience of nurses who cared for patients with a confirmed COVID‐19 diagnosis, as well as factors that potentially contributed to that resilience. A total of 23 frontline nurses who cared for patients with COVID‐19 were recruited from a COVID‐19–designated facility in Shanghai, China, using purposive sampling strategies. In‐depth interviews were conducted from March to May 2020. Qualitative data were transcribed verbatim and content analysis was used. Nurses exhibited psychological resilience while caring for patients with COVID‐19. They displayed an ability to bounce back from negative mental experiences and transform to a positive mindset to cope with the stress they faced. Factors that enhanced the nurses' resilience during the pandemic were their becoming familiar with infectious disease protocols, having a sense of professional achievement, receiving social support, having trust in the infection‐control response team in the hospital, and using self‐regulation strategies. This study could guide the design of future resilience‐enhancing interventions that provide positive coping strategies for nurses caring for individuals with infectious diseases during a pandemic.

Healthcare Workers' Resilience Mediates the Influence of Organizational Commitment and Anxiety Response to Viral Epidemic on Their Quality of Life in the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…Previous studies have reported that a lack of resilience is associated with poor mental health and the pathophysiology of psychiatric symptoms, such as depression and anxiety (23), and it has importance as a predictor of QoL (24). The COVID-19 pandemic is a kind of infectious disease disaster, and resilience is an important dynamic capacity for healthcare workers to maintain their mental health and QoL, and it is necessary for healthcare workers even during normal times (25)(26)(27).…”

Nurses’ experiences of accompanying patients dying during the COVID‐19 pandemic: A qualitative descriptive study

“…A few qualitative studies have been conducted to explore nurses’ experiences of caring for patients during the COVID‐19 pandemic, reporting that inability to provide comfort, experiencing patient deaths, sense of isolation, concerns about PPE, care delays and changed clinical practice guidelines impacted their physical, emotional, psychological and social well‐being (Gordon et al, 2021 ; Montgomery et al, 2021 ). Despite the effects on their physical and emotional well‐being, nurses were willing to work and take care of patients (Villar et al, 2021 ) and develop resilience, meaning the ability to adapt to changes caused by stressful events and to recover from negative emotional experiences, using social support and self‐regulation strategies (Huang et al, 2021 ). To our knowledge, no qualitative studies have been conducted to investigate nurses’ experiences of caring for dying people during the COVID‐19 pandemic and of accompanying dying patients without the presence of the family.…”

“Getting caught unprepared”: A phenomenological study of Indonesian nurses dealing with difficulties when caring for patients with coronavirus disease (COVID‐19)

“…They received support from family members, colleagues, and hospital managers. For instance, parents, spouses, and children regularly talked to them and encouraged them via WeChat (Huang et al, 2021 ). Adequate staffing, education, PPE, and clear guidelines were examples of support that healthcare workers received from hospital managers during COVID‐19 (Nowell et al, 2021 ), SARS (Lee et al, 2005 ), and MERS (Khalid et al, 2016 ).…”

“…Two studies mentioned the use of religious coping at a personal level among healthcare professionals but only limited information was provided in the two publications (Kelley et al, 2021 ; Raven et al, 2018 ). Other studies reported that at the personal level healthcare workers used strategies such as doing exercises, listening to music, writing, and relaxing (Sun et al, 2020 ; Huang et al, 2021 ).…”