Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
34th ECNP Congress – Lisbon 2021 Hybrid, Lisbon, Portekiz, 2 - 05 Ekim 2021, ss.583-584
Introduction: COVID-19 pandemic has a significant impact
on the mental health and well-being of healthcare workers
(HCW). Although compelling life events may cause psychiatric
disorders, sometimes they may end up with positive
changes like post-traumatic growth.
Aims: We aimed to evaluate HCWs’ traumatic stress, anxiety,
and depression levels, as well as post-traumatic growth
levels in the stressful period of the pandemic. Besides we
intend to determine the changes of these variables during
the pandemic process.
Methods: We took the first measurements between May
2020 and July 2020, the second measurements between
November 2020 and January 2021. We used sociodemographic
data form, Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-
9), Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7), Impact of
Events Scale-Revised (IES-R), Post-traumatic Growth Inventory
(PTGI) for data collection. Statistical analyses were
performed using the statistical program for social sciences
SPSS version 23. Measures of skewness and kurtosis were
used to assess the normality of the data. Since the data
showed a normal distribution, we used paired sample Ttest
to compare the baseline and six-month follow-up of the
measurement tools.
Results: 66 health care workers (HCW) were recruited in
this study. 42 (%63.6) HCWs were female, 42 (%63.6) of them
were frontline HCWs, 40 (%60.6) participants were married.
The mean age was 33.51 ± 9.33, the median value of working
years was 8 (4-17). While 16 (24.2 %) HCWs reported major
depressive symptoms during the first study, this prevalence
increased to 22 (33.3%) after six-month measurement.
15 (22.8%) HCWs reported generalized anxiety symptoms in
the first measurement, this trend remained the same, 15
(22.8%), in the second measurement. When the traumatic
stress symptoms were examined, 19 (28.8%) HCWs stated
that severe level of distress in the first measurement, this
prevalence elevated to 20 (30.3%) in the follow-up measurement.
22(33,3 %) HCW reported moderate and high levels of
PTG during the first measurement, 18 (27,3%) HCW reported
moderate and high levels of PTGI.
There was no significant difference between the baseline
depression scores and six-month follow-up (p > 0.05). Similarly,
non-significant differences were found between baseline
and six-month follow-up measurements for anxiety and
traumatic stress scores (p > 0.05). As we compared PTGI
scores of HCWs in the first and second measurements, a
statistically significant difference occurred (p = 0.023). PTGI
scores of the participants significantly decreased over time.
Although the change in depression and distress scores of the
participants in the first and second measurements was not
clinically significant, the scores of depression and distress
increased over time (see Table 1).
Conclusion: Previous studies indicate an inverse-parabolic
relationship between traumatic stress and PTGI score. Our
study provides consistent results. As long as the stressors
continue to exist, like the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic,
individual’s traumatic stress levels increase, and psychi-
atric disorders become more common. Additionally, positive
changes like post-traumatic growth decrease in this con-
text.