Assessment of Mental Health Factors among Health Professionals Exposed to Covid 19

Abstract

Background: A novel coronavirus was identified at the end of 2019 in Wuhan, a city in the Hubei Province of China. It rapidly spread, the World Health Organization (WHO) to declare a public health emergency in late January 2020 and characterize it as a pandemic in March 2020. It was stated that there was high COVID-19 spread risk to various other countries across world. Health workers (HW) at a higher risk of infection. The unexpected crisis is making great amount of stress, anxiety, and depression throughout the world.

 Aim: The aim of this study was to assess the mental health factors among healthcare workers by quantifying the severity of anxiety, depression, and sleep disorders during the second wave of SARS-CoV-2 pandemic

Materials and methods: The study is a cross-sectional, hospital-based survey conducted a total of 180 professionals accomplished the survey. The questionnaire was included of study variables: (a) Gender; (b) age-group range which was categorized into- Between 20 to 39, 40-59 years and above 50 years(c) category of professionals. The category of professionals were Nurses, Technicians and front office staff worked in hospitals. The amount of symptoms of Insomnia, depression, anxiety and distress was evaluated the 9-item Patient Health Questionnaire, the 7-item Insomnia Severity Index, the 7-item Generalized Anxiety Disorder scale, and the 22-item Impact of Event Scale–Revised, respectively. Multivariable logistic regression analysis was executed to recognize factors associated with mental health outcomes. Statistical analysis was performed using the Chi-square test for determining significance.

Results: Mean ± SD values for age were found to be 35.54 ± 6.09; 33.84 ± 7.87; 32.16 ± 5.89 and 55.76 ± 8.98 for nurses, technical staff, and front office staff while the percentages of male study participants was found to be 37.2%, 15%, 57%, and 65% and female study participants was 62.8%, 85%, 43%, and 35% for the physicians, nursing staff, technicians, and non-healthcare professionals.

A substantial portion of participants conveyed symptoms of depression 42.4%, anxiety 54.6%, insomnia 32.0%, and distress 69.2%. Nurses, women, technical staff, have more severe amount of total of mental health symptoms than other health care workers.  Patient Health Questionnaire scores among technicians vs nurses: 4.0 [1.0-7.0] vs 5.0 [2.0-8.0]; P = .007; median Generalized Anxiety Disorder scale scores among men vs women: 2.0 [0-6.0] vs 4.0 [1.0-7.0]; P < .001; median [IQR] Insomnia Severity Index scores among front office vs technicians: 6.0 [2.0-11.0] vs 4.0 [1.0-8.0]; P < .001; median [IQR] Impact of Event Scale.

Conclusion: The technicians are directly engaged in the diagnosis and investigations of COVID-19 patients.

Key words: SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, COVID-19; Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ 9), Generalized Anxiety Disorder scale (GAD-7), Insomnia Severity Index (ISI)