Nurses' Emotional Stress Levels When Caring for COVID-19 Patients in an Intensive Care Unit.

Lin, Qingqing; Zheng, Yuanren

Context The COVID-19 pandemic has had an effect on many communities' physical and mental well-being, especially that of healthcare workers. During the pandemic, health workers have shown signs of depression and anxiety and have experienced sleep disturbances. Few studies have examined health workers' resilience during the pandemic. Objective The current study intended to examine the job stress and mental well-being of nurses who have supported, worked with, and cared for COVID-19 patients in an intensive care unit. Design The research team performed a narrative review by searching the Mendeley, ScienceDirect, Medline, PubMed, Google Scholar, and Springer databases. The search used many keywords, both alone and in combination, such as COVID-19, pandemic, nurses, healthcare professionals, stress, and frontline workers. The review considered only English journals. Setting This study was take place in Second Affiliated Hospital of Hainan Medical University, Hainan Province, China. Results During the current pandemic, COVID-19 prevention in social settings, governmental regulation during the pandemic, and provision of frontline care have faced notable challenges. In general, nurses who have assisted during the COVID-19 pandemic have been under severe strain. The key factors that influenced nurses' stress were being only children, their working time per week, and their levels of anxiety. Conclusions COVID-19 has posed a vast threat to public health worldwide. The psychological stress of nurses should be managed in public-health emergencies.