Differences in levels of psychological distress, perceived safety, trust, and efficacy amongst hospital personnel during the COVID-19 pandemic.

ABSTRACT

The COVID-19 pandemic poses significant challenges to healthcare systems worldwide. A key consideration is the adverse psychological impact on healthcare workers (HCWs). This study aimed to investigate the variable levels of psychological distress, perceived safety, trust, and self- and collective-efficacy during the COVID-19 crisis amongst varied HCWs. A survey was disseminated to nurses, physicians, interns, and administrative and logistical staff at an acute-care hospital in Israel during the first wave of COVID-19. The survey consisted of items on a 5-point Likert scale, measuring HCW's perceptions concerning the aforementioned variables as well as demographic information. A total of 716 hospital personnel completed the survey. Nurses reported higher levels of psychological distress and lower levels of trust in the hospital's COVID-19 guidelines compared to physicians (2.3 vs. 2.0 and 3.7 vs. 4.0, respectively). Nurses and interns felt the least safe when working in the hospital. Nurses reported the highest levels of concern regarding fear of uncontrollable spread, infection, and family transmission of the virus. Interns reported the lowest levels of self- and collective-efficacy. In a regression model, the variables that predicted 32% of distress among nurses were age, gender, level of religiosity, indices of perceived safety, and self-efficacy. This study demonstrated differences in distress and perceived safety, trust, and efficacy between varied HCWs during COVID-19. This variability should be considered when designing policies to protect HCWs' wellbeing during future pandemics.