ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: When facing major emergency public accidents, men and women may react differently. Our research aimed to assess the influence of gender difference on social support, information preference, biological rhythm, psychological distress, and the possible interaction among these factors during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: In this cross-sectional study, 3,237 respondents aged 12 years and older finished the online survey. Levels of social support, information preference, biological rhythm, and psychological distress were assessed using validated scales. A path analysis was conducted to explore possible associations among these variables. RESULTS: The path analysis indicated that women with high levels of social support had a lower possibility of biological rhythm disorders and lower levels of somatization symptoms of psychological distress during the COVID-19 pandemic. The influence of social support on somatization symptoms was exerted via biological rhythm. Women tended to believe both negative and positive information, while men preferred more extreme information. CONCLUSION: Our results highlighted gender difference in study variables during the COVID-19 pandemic and the importance of social support in alleviating psychological distress and biological rhythm disorders. Moreover, we confirmed that information preference differed significantly by somatization symptoms of psychological distress, suggesting extra efforts to provide more individualized epidemic information. Longitudinal research is required to further explore casual inferences.
Subject(s)
COVID-19 , Psychological Distress , COVID-19/epidemiology , China/epidemiology , Cross-Sectional Studies , Female , Humans , Male , Pandemics , Periodicity , SARS-CoV-2ABSTRACT
Objective: The purpose of this meta-analysis was to summarize the prevalence and risk factors of mental health problems among healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: We applied an optimized search strategy across the PubMed, EMBASE, Scopus, PsycINFO, and four Chinese databases, with hand searching supplemented to identify relevant surveys. Studies were eligible for inclusion if they were published in peer-reviewed literature and used a validated method to assess the prevalence and risk factors of mental health problems among healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Heterogeneity was quantified using Q statistics and the I 2 statistics. The potential causes of heterogeneity were investigated using subgroup analysis and meta-regression analysis. Sensitivity analysis was performed to examine the robustness of the results. Results: We pooled and analyzed data from 20 studies comprising 10,886 healthcare workers. The prevalence of depression, anxiety, insomnia, post-traumatic stress symptoms, phobia, obsessive-compulsive symptoms, and somatization symptoms was 24.1, 28.6, 44.1, 25.6, 35.0, 16.2, and 10.7%, respectively. Female and nurses had a high prevalence of depression and anxiety. Frontline healthcare workers had a higher prevalence of anxiety and a lower prevalence of depression than the those in the second-line. Furthermore, the proportion of moderate-severe depression and anxiety is higher in the frontline. Additionally, four studies reported on risk factors of mental health problems. Conclusions: In this systematic review, healthcare workers have a relatively high prevalence of depression, anxiety, insomnia, post-traumatic stress symptoms, phobia, obsessive-compulsive symptoms, and somatization symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic, and focus should be on the healthcare workers at high risk of mental problems. Mental health problems in healthcare workers should be taken seriously, and timely screening and appropriate intervention for the high-risk group are highly recommended. Systematic Review Registration:https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?ID=CRD42020179189.