Spirituality as a protective factor for chronic and acute anxiety in Brazilian healthcare workers during the COVID-19 outbreak.
PLoS One
; 17(5): e0267556, 2022.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1910604
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
Anxiety symptoms (AS) are exacerbated in healthcare workers (HCWs) during the COVID-19 pandemic. Spirituality is known to protect against AS in the general population and it is a construct that differs from religion. It can be assessed using structured questionnaires. A validated questionnaire disclosed three spirituality dimensions peace, meaning, and faith. In HCWs we investigated the predictors of chronic anxiety (pre-COVID-19 and during the pandemic) and acute anxiety (only during the pandemic), including spirituality in the model. Then, we verified which spirituality dimensions predicted chronic and acute anxiety. Lastly, we studied group differences between the mean scores of these spirituality dimensions. MATERIAL ANDMETHODS:
The study was carried out in a Brazilian Hospital. HCWs (n = 118) were assessed for spirituality at a single time-point. They were also asked about AS that had started pre-COVID-19 and persisted during the pandemic (chronic anxiety), and AS that had started only during the pandemic (acute anxiety). The subjects without chronic anxiety were subdivided into two other groups acute anxiety and without chronic and acute anxiety. Forward stepwise logistic regressions were used to find the significant AS predictors. First, the model considered sex, age, religious affiliation, and spirituality. Then, the analysis were performed considering only the three spirituality dimensions. Group means differences in the spirituality dimensions were compared using univariate ANCOVAS followed by T-tests.RESULTS:
Spirituality was the most realible predictor of chronic (OR = 0.818; 95%CI0.752-0.890; p<0.001) and acute anxiety (OR = 0.727; 95%CI0.601-0.881; p = 0.001). Peace alone predicted chronic anxiety (OR = 0.619; 95%CI0.516-0.744; p<0.001) while for acute anxiety both peace (OR0.517; 95%CI0.340-0.787; p = 0.002), and faith (OR0.674; 95%CI0.509-0.892; p = 0.006) significantly contributed to the model. Faith was significantly higher in subjects without AS.CONCLUSION:
Higher spirituality protected against chronic and acute anxiety. Faith and peace spirituality dimensions conferred protection against acute anxiety during the pandemic.
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
COVID-19
/
Graft vs Host Disease
Type of study:
Etiology study
/
Experimental Studies
/
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
/
Qualitative research
/
Randomized controlled trials
Topics:
Long Covid
Limits:
Humans
Country/Region as subject:
South America
/
Brazil
Language:
English
Journal:
PLoS One
Journal subject:
Science
/
Medicine
Year:
2022
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Journal.pone.0267556
Similar
MEDLINE
...
LILACS
LIS