HYDERABAD: What is the psychological burden of the pandemic on healthcare workers? A new study from the Apollo Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Hyderabad suggests that not only is stress growing amongst the healthcare community but so are more serious conditions such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and depression.
The study had 345 participants from the hospital itself who answered the questionnaire-based cross-sectional survey in the period of May, 2020-August, 2020. Their responses were scored as per both the ‘depression, anxiety, and stress scale 21 (DASS-21)’ and the Impact of Event Revised (IES-R) scales. One of the key findings of the study was that over half (a total of 56.88 per cent including male and female) of the sample of Healtchcare Workers endorsed PTSD with worsening symptoms from the lockdown to post-lockdown.
The study notes this was both due to the increased workload and constant contact with Covid-19 patients. Amongst the group of HCWs, the non-medical staff were more impacted than medical staff. “During the lockdown, the highest levels of PTSD was observed in pharmacists and technicians (25.27 per cent) followed by nurses (23.81 per cent) and front desk people (23.57 per cent). Post-lockdown too, pharmacists and technicians were the people who had the highest levels of PTSD (31.60 per cent), followed by nurses (29.98 per cent),” found the study. The PTSD scores in doctors increased from 23.42 per cent to 26.32 per cent indicative of increased traumatic stress. These figures are out of a cut-off score of 24 where anything above this is clinically concerning PTSD.
Risk due to contact with Covid patients
One of the key findings of the study by AIMSR was that over half (a total of 56.88 per cent including male and female) of the sample of Healtchcare Workers endorsed PTSD with worsening symptoms from the lockdown to post-lockdown. The study notes that this was both due to the increased workload and constant contact with Covid-19 patients. Amongst the group of Healtchcare Workers, the non-medical staff were more impacted than medical staff.