A Wake-up Call for Burnout in Portuguese Physicians During the COVID-19 Outbreak: National Survey Study.
JMIR Public Health Surveill
; 7(6): e24312, 2021 06 09.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2197877
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
The COVID-19 outbreak has imposed physical and psychological pressure on health care professionals, including frontline physicians. Hence, evaluating the mental health status of physicians during the current pandemic is important to define future preventive guidelines among health care stakeholders.OBJECTIVE:
In this study, we intended to study alterations in the mental health status of Portuguese physicians working at the frontline during the COVID-19 pandemic and potential sociodemographic factors influencing their mental health status.METHODS:
A nationwide survey was conducted during May 4-25, 2020, to infer differences in mental health status (depression, anxiety, stress, and obsessive compulsive symptoms) between Portuguese physicians working at the frontline during the COVID-19 pandemic and other nonfrontline physicians. A representative sample of 420 participants stratified by age, sex, and the geographic region was analyzed (200 frontline and 220 nonfrontline participants). Moreover, we explored the influence of several sociodemographic factors on mental health variables including age, sex, living conditions, and household composition.RESULTS:
Our results show that being female (ß=1.1; t=2.5; P=.01) and working at the frontline (ß=1.4; t=2.9; P=.004) are potential risk factors for stress. In contrast, having a house with green space was a potentially beneficial factor for stress (ß=-1.5; t=-2.5; P=.01) and anxiety (ß=-1.1; t=-2.4; P=.02).CONCLUSIONS:
It is important to apply protective mental health measures for physicians to avoid the long-term effects of stress, such as burnout.Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Physicians
/
Burnout, Professional
/
Mental Health
/
Pandemics
/
COVID-19
Type of study:
Experimental Studies
/
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
/
Randomized controlled trials
Topics:
Long Covid
Limits:
Adult
/
Aged
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
/
Middle aged
Country/Region as subject:
Europa
Language:
English
Journal:
JMIR Public Health Surveill
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
24312
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