Stress, Sleep and Psychological Impact in Healthcare Workers During the Early Phase of COVID-19 in India: A Factor Analysis

  1. Seshadri Sekhar Chatterjee
  2. Madhushree Chakrabarty
  3. Debanjan Banerjee
  4. Sandeep Grover
  5. Shiv Sekhar Chatterjee
  6. Utpal Dan

Reviewed by

Read the full article

Discuss this preprint

Start a discussion What are Sciety discussions?

Listed in

Log in to save this article

Abstract

Background: Risks to healthcare workers have escalated during the pandemic and they are likely to experience a greater level of stress. This cross-sectional study investigated mental distress among healthcare workers during the early phase of Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) outbreak in India.

Method: 140 healthcare workers of a tertiary care hospital in India were assessed for perceived stress and insomnia. A factor analysis with principal component method reduced these questions to four components which were categorized as insomnia, stress-related anxiety, stress-related irritability, and stress-related hopelessness. Further statistical analyses were done on these factor scores to identify the predictors and investigate the differences between the different categories of healthcare workers.

Result: Doctors had the highest level of anxiety among the healthcare workers. Both doctors and nurses perceived a greater level of irritability than the other HCWs. Compared to doctors and nurses, other HCWs were more likely to experience insomnia. Lower age, higher education, female gender, and urban habitat were associated with greater perception of anxiety. Older age, being quarantined, and single marital status were the significant predictors of irritability. Female gender, single marital-status, and higher number of medical ailments contributed to perceived hopelessness. Quarantine significantly predicted insomnia.

Conclusion: Different categories of healthcare workers are experiencing varied mental health problems owing to their heterogeneous socio-demographic backgrounds. Tailored and personalized care, as well as policies, might help in alleviating their problems. Further research is warranted to explore the psychological distress and remedies among these frontline workers during and after the ongoing pandemic crisis.

Article activity feed

  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.09.22.20199323: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board StatementIACUC: 2.1. Ethics: The study was approved by the institutional ethics committee (XXXXX/2020/349/10).
    Consent: All participants signed an informed consent form approved by the above committee. 2.2. Settings: The study was conducted from 20th April to 20th May at Diamond Harbour Government Medical College & Hospital (DHGMC), West Bengal, India.
    RandomizationDHGMC was converted into a COVID-19 treatment center, well equipped with an isolation ward, quarantine center, fever clinic, and COVID-19 testing facility. 2.3. Participants: Of the 550 HCWs employed at DHGMC, 250 randomly selected HCWs, who were on duty during the COVID-19 outbreak, were invited to take part in the study.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variableThere were 55 doctors (Age: M = 39.22±9.3, 33 Male and 22 Female), 45 nurses (Age: M = 39.60 ±11.6; 0 Male and 45 Female), 20 ward staff (Age: M = 31.45 ±4.8; 20 Male and 0 Female), and 17 non-clinical staff (Age: M = 34.06 ±7.2; 6 Male and 11 Female). 2.4. Measures: Demographic information was obtained using a customized demographic data sheet.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    The data were coded and preprocessed in Microsoft Excel (
    Microsoft Excel
    suggested: (Microsoft Excel, RRID:SCR_016137)
    Statistical analyses were performed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) Statistics for Windows, Version 20.0
    SPSS
    suggested: (SPSS, RRID:SCR_002865)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  2. Version published to 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.611314
  3. Version published to 10.1101/2020.09.22.20199323 on medRxiv