The impact of COVID-19 on healthcare workers’ anxiety levels
Open accessAbstract
Aim This study aims to examine the effect of COVID-19 on the anxiety levels of healthcare employees.Methods This descriptive study used the snowball sampling method to recruit participants. The study was conducted between 18 and 25 April 2020 with a total of 710 participants. The data were collected using a sociodemographic questionnaire and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. Ethics committee approval was obtained to conduct the study, and the data were analyzed using the SPSS 24.0 statistical package program using descriptive statistics, t tests and ANOVA.Results In the study, 46.8% of the participants were in the 26-35 age group, 60.7% were female, 19.9% worked at clinics with COVID-19 patients (service, intensive care and emergency clinics), and 17.6% had a chronic disease. The state and trait anxiety mean scores of the participants were 60.29 ± 6.13 and 44.18 ± 7.69, respectively. Statistically significant differences were found in the participants' state and trait anxiety levels with respect to their age, gender, unit of work, marital status, status of having children and presence of a chronic disease (p < 0.05).Conclusion The state and trait anxiety levels of the healthcare workers in the study were found to be "severe" and "moderate," respectively.
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In recent years, the prevalence of psychological disorders such as anxiety, depression, and somatic symptoms has increased among health professionals.
“In recent years, the prevalence of psychological disorders such as anxiety, depression, and somatic symptoms has increased among this population”
From Effectiveness of a Web-Based Self-Guided Intervention (MINDxYOU) for Reducing Stress and Promoting Mental Health Among Health Professionals: Results From a Stepped-Wedge Cluster Randomized Trial (2025) · cites this paper as [4]
The Introduction (page unavailable) says pandemic-related stress may trigger anxiety, somatization and depressive disorders in healthcare workers, and the Discussion (page unavailable) reports severe anxiety in more than half of the workers studied. The paper does not establish that the prevalence of all three conditions has increased over recent years; its findings concern anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic. (LLM, conf=0.85)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredThe increase in psychological disorders among health professionals has been linked to the extra efforts exerted by health workers and the extremely difficult situations to which they were exposed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“which has been linked to the extra efforts exerted by health workers and the extremely difficult situations to which they were exposed during the COVID-19 pandemic [3-6].”
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- Authors
- Karasu, F., Öztürk Çopur, E., & Ayar, D.
- Affiliations
- Kilis 7 Aralık University (TR)
- Gaziantep İslam Bilim ve Teknoloji Üniversitesi (TR)
- Corresponding author
- Karasu, Fatma
- Venue
- Journal of Public Health
- Published
- 2021-01-04
- Volume
- 30
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 1399-1409
- ISSN
- 0943-1853 (ISSN-L)
- 2198-1833
- 1613-2238
- PMC
- PMC7779328
- OpenAlex
- W3120132329
- Cited by
- 29
- References
- 32
- Citations by year
- 2025: 3 · 2024: 6 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 4
- FWCI
- 4.43
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Update notices
- correction (2024-07-09)
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Journal of Public Health (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- no
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › COVID-19 and Mental Health
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Healthcare professionals’ stress and burnout
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › Occupational Therapy › Occupational Health and Burnout
- Keywords
- COVID-19 pandemic, healthcare workers, anxiety, state anxiety, trait anxiety, occupational stress, chronic disease, sociodemographic factors, intensive care, emergency department
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