Challenges and Barriers to the Participation of Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in Flood Management: A Qualitative Study from Iran.

OBJECTIVE: Floods are one of Iran's most important natural hazards, which cause a lot of damage every year. Various organizations, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs), participate in flood management. The present study aimed to explore the challenges and barriers of NGOs' participation in the management of the flooding in Iran based on stakeholders' experiences. METHODS: This qualitative study is a case study that was conducted using the content analysis approach. Fifteen participants, including 3 national managers, 2 volunteers active in responding to recent floods, and 10 NGO managers/secretaries who had the knowledge or operational experience of participating in disaster management, were approached for interviews. Data were collected using a purposeful sampling method and continued until reaching data saturation. RESULTS: Challenges and barriers to NGOs' participation in flood management were categorized into 4 main categories and 14 subcategories, including policy-making challenges, managerial challenges, executive challenges, and socio-cultural challenges. CONCLUSIONS: As multiple NGOs take part in responding to disasters and performing relief operations, establishing a unified command and supervision system for effective coordination and collaborations among NGOs and other stakeholders is highly suggested. Further research is needed to develop a measurement tool for assessing the effectiveness of NGOs' activities during disasters.

The Prevalence of Generalized Anxiety Disorder Among Health Care Workers During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Introduction: Health care workers, due to be involved in caring for COVID-19 patients may experience various psychological problems including anxiety disorders. This study aimed to investigate the prevalence of Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) among health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic by systematic review and meta-analysis. Methods: The PRISMA guideline was used for conducting this study. Related keywords were searched in credited resources including ISC, Magiran, PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, Cochrane, ProQuest, Science Direct, Google Scholar, and Embase to find the articles published on the prevalence of GAD among health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic from the first of January to the end of June 2020. Meta-analysis was conducted by the random effects model. Results: In this study, 553 articles were initially identified, from which 19 studies were finally included in the meta-analysis. The results showed that the prevalence of GAD in health care workers based on the GAD-7 and GAD-2 instruments were 32.04% (95% CI: 26.89-37.19, I 2 = 98.2%, p < 0.001) and 22.62% (95% CI: 9.01-36.24, I 2 = 97.7%, p < 0.001). The overall prevalence of GAD was obtained 30.5% (95% CI: 25.58-35.42, I 2 = 98.4%, p < 0.001). Conclusion: This study showed a relatively high GAD prevalence, as one of the fundamental psychological problems, among health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, health system managers should implement preventive strategies to protect health staff from contracting the virus and monitor them for psychological problems and provide them with supportive measures if necessary.