The Physical and Psychological Effects of Personal Protective Equipment on Health Care Workers in Wuhan, China: A Cross-Sectional Survey Study

Abstract

The current literature on health care workers wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) indicates that they experience a wide variety of discomfort, especially for nurses in the emergency department. This article contributes mainly that the discomfort caused by wearing PPE could be classified into 7 categories: (1) dizziness, (2) dyspnea, (3) nausea, (4) micturition desire, (5) retroauricular pain, (6) thirst, and (7) inconvenience at work. More complaints about uncomfortable symptoms and pressure sores were reported by female physicians and nurses and by those working at designated hospitals or in intensive care units and working in PPE for more than 4 hours. Key implications for emergency nursing practice are that shorter time per shift, adequate protective products, and proper psychological interventions may be beneficial to relieve discomfort.

Adverse Effects of Personal Protective Equipment Among Intensive Care Unit Healthcare Professionals During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Scoping Review

“…The flow diagram is presented in Online Appendix 3. We included 12 cross-sectional studies (Bharatendu et al., 2020; Çağlar et al., 2020 ; Hajjij et al., 2020 ; Heider et al., 2021 ; Jiang, Liu, et al., 2020 ; Jiang, Song, et al., 2020 ; Ong et al., 2020 ; Ramanan et al., 2020 ; Swaminathan et al., 2020 ; Tabah et al., 2020; Unoki et al., 2020; Xia et al., 2020 ), three case reports ( Chiriac et al., 2020 ; Dell’Era et al., 2020 ; Lam et al., 2020 ), three reviews ( Downie, 2020 ; Gefen & Ousey, 2020 ; Gross et al., 2021 ), including a systematic review, two observational studies ( Abiakam et al., 2021 ; Choudhury et al., 2020 ) including a study combined with a point prevalence study, a retrospective study ( He et al., 2020 ), two qualitative studies ( Begerow et al., 2020 ; Hoernke et al., 2021 ), and two letters without cases or data ( Goh et al., 2020 ; Wiwanitkit, 2020 ). Participants of seven studies were exclusively HCWs working in the ICUs; however, participants of the remaining studies included HCWs working in the ICU.…”

The Influence of the COVID-19 Event on Deviant Workplace Behavior Taking Tianjin, Beijing and Hebei as an Example

“…The global economy has been hindered since the outbreak of novel coronavirus pneumonia [ 7 ], and during the epidemic, 22.3% of companies reduced their operating pressures by cutting staff and salaries, and 15.8% even halted work completely, which had a major impact on the psychological state of employees [ 8 ]. Due to opaque information and excessive negative public opinion, employees have a negative attitude towards personal employment prospects, business management level, and macroeconomic situation [ 9 ].…”

Infection Control and Vaccine Hesitancy in the Emergency Department

“…2 This JEN issue also includes 7 COVID-19-specific manuscripts. [3][4][5][6][7][8][9] As the state of knowledge and evidence-based practice have been rapidly evolving in the pandemic, the manuscripts reflect updated knowledge at the time of submission. These manuscripts provide crucial evidence and practice application for both the ongoing pandemic response as well as reference material for future infectious disease prevention and response stages.…”

“…Frontline clinicians in hospitals in Wuhan, China, where the COVID-19 pandemic response began, surveyed 297 health care workers about safety measures, training, and discomforts associated with personal protective equipment (PPE) donning, wearing, and doffing. 8 The authors Xia et al 8 relay their pragmatic lessons learned, with recommendations for staffing, limitations in direct patient care hours, PPE education, and measures to increase clinician comfort during PPE wear. COVID-19 clinical review and overview of the nursing care essentials are provided by Deitrick et al, 6 whereas Hu et al 4 enable an international perspective on the nursing care essentials for patients in isolation while suspected of, but not yet confirmed with, a severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 infection.…”

“…[10][11][12] Like many welldesigned disaster preparedness programs, the actual disaster did not create the full need for the planned program as the authors had anticipated, but the program development process, template, and educational tools are included here in JEN as a resource for program replication and testing in other emergency departments, regardless of pandemic conditions. 9 This issue of JEN also includes infectious disease-related manuscripts on topics of Ebola, 13 HIV, 14 rabies, 15 and PPE, 8,13 vaccine, 16 antibiotic, 17 antipyretic, 18 and phlebotomy 19 interventions.…”