ABSTRACT
Background: With the onset of the coronavirus crisis, the medical treatment staffs were at the forefront of dealing with the disease. The lived experiences in the face of this disease can help better manage the epidemic and identify organizational and individual barriers and challenges. This study aimed to investigate the experiences of medical staff working in COVID-19 wards in Shiraz teaching hospitals. Methods: The present study is a qualitative study conducted in 2021-2022. A semi-structured interview was used to collect data. Eighteen nurses, physicians, and health workers of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences were employed for the interview. The snowball sampling technique based on the target group was used. Data were analyzed by The Colaizzi seven-step analysis method. Results: Three themes, including "tensions”, "material and spiritual support”, and "pleasant feeling” and eight sub-themes were extracted. The sub-themes were "resilience”, "insufficient knowledge”, "depression”, "expressing gratitude by friends”, "public attention”, "organizational support”, "feeling proud”, and "altruism”. Conclusion: The present study shows that COVID- 19 caused a lot of pressure on the medical staff during the pandemic, which led to psychological and emotional damage. On the other hand, material and spiritual support played an important role in reducing distress in times of crisis. © 2023 Authors. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
Co-occurrence of chronic diseases in the elderly is a common problem in the field of healthcare worldwide. In countries where life expectancy is high and non-communicable diseases are more common than communicable diseases, it has been reported that more than half of the elderly have at least two chronic diseases with different pathologies. The most common diseases in the elderly with Covid-19 are high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular diseases and respiratory system diseases. Studies have shown that patients with multiple chronic diseases have a worse prognosis than patients with only one disease. However, the relationship between the type of disease and the number of concurrent diseases with the prognosis of elderly patients with Covid-19 is not definitely known. Due to the vulnerability of the elderly, prevention of the exacerbation of the disease, triage and prioritization of patients and reduction of mortality caused by Covid-19 is a big challenge. Many studies have focused on the clinical characteristics of Covid-19 patients, and information about the factors affecting the severity and lethality of the disease among the elderly is still limited. Therefore, this study was conducted in order to describe the demographic and clinical characteristics and investigate the relationship between co-morbidity and underlying diseases with the severity and mortality caused by Covid-19 in the elderly. Copyright © 2022 Wolters Kluwer Medknow Publications. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
To examine the impact of COVID-19 measures on residents of long-term care institutions, two surveys were conducted in the spring of 2020. Leontjevas et al. (study 1) inventoried practitioners' opinions, Van der Roest et al. (study 2) opinions of care workers, family, and residents without severe cognitive impairments. This article describes the combined results on social interaction and loneliness, challenging behaviour and mood, and lessons learned. In study 1, an online survey distributed to nursing home psychologists, they were asked to complete it anonymously and share the link with their fellow elderly care physicians and nurse specialists. 16 participants were then interviewed via video calling. In study 2, three hundred and fifty-seven care organizations were invited to recruit residents without severe cognitive impairments, family members and care workers for participating in a digital, anonymous survey (Study 2). The completed surveys of 323 practitioners (study 1) and 193 residents, 1609 family members and 811 employees (study 2) were included in the analyses. Social contacts of residents had changed in frequency and form compared to before the COVID-measures. Many residents experienced some loneliness during the visit ban, especially residents without cognitive impairments. There were both an increase and a decrease in challenging behaviour and affect. Several strategies used to reduce the effects of COVID-19 measures on well-being, were considered maintainable. Our studies confirmed a major impact of the COVID-19 measures on the wellbeing of long-term care residents, but also showed successful strategies of practitioners that can benefit future practice.