College of Medicine, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Department of Pediatrics, King Saud University Medical City, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Faculty of Medicine, King Saud University, Saudi Arabia.
College of Medicine, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Department of Pediatrics, King Saud University Medical City, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
J Infect Public Health. 2020 Jun;13(6):877-882. doi: 10.1016/j.jiph.2020.05.021. Epub 2020 May 29.
The global pandemic of coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19) has led to unprecedented psychological stress on health workers (HCWs). We aimed to assess the psychological impact of COVID-19 on HCWs in comparison to the stress brought on by the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) epidemic in Saudi Arabia.
Between February 5th and 16th, 2020, 811 health-care workers (HCWs) of a tertiary care teaching hospital were invited to fill a questionnaire regarding concerns and worries about the novel coronavirus pandemic, along with Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7) Anxiety Severity screening tool.
Out of 582 HCWs who completed the survey questionnaire (response rate of 71.8%), about 40% were exposed previously to MERS-CoV infected or suspected patients during a previous hospital outbreak. While there were no COVID-19 cases reported yet in Saudi Arabia at the time of data collection, still, the anxiety level from COVID-19 was significantly higher than that from MERS-CoV or seasonal influenza: 41.1% were more worried about COVID-19, 41.4% were similarly worried about both MERS-CoV and COVID-19, and 17.5% were more stressed by the previous MERS-CoV hospital outbreak. The most frequent concern was transmitting the infection to family and friends (2.71/5) than to themselves only (2.57/5).
Pandemic and epidemic infectious diseases such as COVID-19 or MERS-CoV impose a significant level of anxiety and stress on healthcare workers who are caring of infected patients, with their main concern being the risk of transmitting the infection to their families or to acquire it themselves. Therefore, optimizing the compliance of healthcare workers with the proper infection prevention and control measures is paramount during the infectious disease outbreak, to ensure their safety, to decrease the likelihood of getting infected or transmitting the infection to others, and consequently to alleviate their psychological stress and anxiety.
2019 年冠状病毒病（COVID-19）的全球大流行给卫生保健工作者（HCWs）带来了前所未有的心理压力。我们旨在评估 COVID-19 对 HCWs 的心理影响，并与沙特阿拉伯中东呼吸综合征冠状病毒（MERS-CoV）流行带来的压力进行比较。
2020 年 2 月 5 日至 16 日，我们邀请了一家三级保健教学医院的 811 名医护人员（HCWs）填写一份关于对新型冠状病毒大流行的担忧和顾虑的问卷，以及广泛性焦虑症（GAD-7）焦虑严重程度筛查工具。
在完成调查问卷调查的 582 名 HCWs 中（回应率为 71.8%），约有 40%的人在之前的医院疫情爆发期间曾接触过 MERS-CoV 感染或疑似患者。虽然当时沙特阿拉伯还没有报告 COVID-19 病例，但 COVID-19 的焦虑水平仍明显高于 MERS-CoV 或季节性流感：41.1%的人更担心 COVID-19，41.4%的人对 MERS-CoV 和 COVID-19 同样担心，而 17.5%的人对之前的 MERS-CoV 医院疫情爆发更为紧张。最常见的担忧是将感染传染给家人和朋友（2.71/5），而不是仅传染给自己（2.57/5）。
像 COVID-19 或 MERS-CoV 这样的大流行和传染病会给照顾感染患者的医护人员带来相当程度的焦虑和压力，他们最关心的是将感染传染给家人或自己的风险。因此，在传染病爆发期间，优化医护人员对适当感染预防和控制措施的遵守至关重要，以确保他们的安全，降低感染或传染给他人的可能性，从而减轻他们的心理压力和焦虑。
