ABSTRACT
During COVID-19 Pandemic, diagnostic laboratories played a vital role in outbreak investigation, surveillance, patient monitoring, and therapeutic effectiveness, and hampered the transmission cycle globally. In Pakistan, the health department took an initiative to build BSL-III labs at divisional levels. A qualitative study was conducted among healthcare professionals from 13 major public health national-level laboratories through in-depth interviews with key informants to note down the challenges they faced during the COVID-19 pandemic during diagnostic testing. In this study, 77 % of public health laboratories faced sampling, administrative, and leadership issues. 53 % of laboratories have faced the unavailability of well-trained staff and human resources while both the biosafety and biosecurity protocols, and the lack of resources were compromised in 69 % of labs. Some lab staff (54 %) felt the wastage of resources in terms of excessive testing and fake sampling, while others (54 %) discussed a lack of training and work experience issues. As the majority of the technical lab staff was hired in temporary consultancy mode so 61 % of issues were related to late salaries. 38 % of issues were about fake reporting pressure from higher authorities. 69 % had issues with the continuous supply chain of kits, reagents, PPEs, etc. The work environment was not up to the mark of 69 %. High workload and mental health issues were faced by 92 %, while waste management was 23 %, shortage of lab space for massive testing by 38 %, and stigma and discrimination among healthcare workers and the general public due to involvement in COVID-19 testing were felt by 46 %. © Pakistan Academy of Sciences.
ABSTRACT
At present, carrying out remote work activities has been considered a process that implies radical changes in the ways of working both for the employee and the organization. This has generated a series of reflections and learnings, that must be considered because there are some implications that were not contemplated before COVID-19, such as the effects on the physical and emotional health of people and the impact on the achievement of objectives, causing the human resources areas, to develop actions focused on improving conditions for remote work in order to reduce stress levels through comprehensive wellness schemes. Since the moment that the World Health Organization declared the pandemic due to COVID-19 on March 2020, the design of strategies from the enterprise perspective began, and to protect the health of employees, the opportunity to carry out work from home was given. The aim of this research is to know the effects of work stress and work-life balance from doing remote work due to the COVID-19 isolation situation, as well as to measure the validity and reliability of the measuring instrument. For the development of the quantitative, descriptive, and relational research, an online questionnaire with 21 items was designed and applied to adults who performed remote work activities, in the cities of Monterrey Mexico, Lima Peru during the months of April and May 2020 and in the Ñuble region in Chile during September and October 2020, obtaining a total of 425 useful responses to carry out the corresponding analysis, highlighting that there are statistically significant differences in the variables used in the research according to the country, showing indicators of validity, reliability, and consistency in the various samples obtained as well as the existence of negative relationships between stress and remote work and positive relationships with work-life balance. In the future, it is intended to continue this research in the Latin American context.Alternate :Desde el momento que la Organización Mundial de la Salud declara la pandemia a causa del COVID-19 en el mes de marzo de 2020, se inicia el diseño de estrategias desde el punto de vista empresarial y con la finalidad de proteger la salud de los trabajadores, se dio la oportunidad de realizar su trabajo desde casa, por lo que el objetivo de esta investigación es conocer los efectos del estrés laboral y el balance vida trabajo, por realizar trabajo a distancia debido a la situación por el aislamiento por el COVID-19, así como medir la validez y confiabilidad del instrumento de medida. Para el desarrollo de la investigación cuantitativa, de tipo descriptiva y relacional, se diseñó un cuestionario en línea con 21 reactivos, que se aplicó a personas mayores de edad que estuvieran realizando actividades de trabajo a distancia, en las ciudades de Monterrey México, Lima Perú durante los meses de abril y mayo del 2020 y principalmente en la región de Ñuble en Chile durante septiembre y octubre del 2020, logrando obtener un total de 425 respuestas útiles para hacer los análisis correspondientes, destacando que sí existen diferencias estadísticamente significativas en las variables utilizadas en la investigación de acuerdo al país, mostrando indicadores de validez, confiabilidad y consistencia en las diversas muestras obtenidas así como la existencia de relaciones negativas entre el estrés y el trabajo a distancia y positivas con el balance vida trabajo.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: In late January, a worldwide crisis known as COVID-19 was declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern by the WHO. Within only a few weeks, the outbreak took on pandemic proportions, affecting over 100 countries. It was a significant issue to prevent and control COVID-19 on both national and global scales due to the dramatic increase in confirmed cases worldwide. Government guidelines provide a fundamental resource for communities, as they guide citizens on how to protect themselves against COVID-19, however, they also provide critical guidance for policy makers and healthcare professionals on how to take action to decrease the spread of COVID-19. We aimed to identify the differences and similarities between six different countries' (US, China, South Korea, UK, Brazil and Haiti) government-provided community and healthcare system guidelines, and to explore the relationship between guideline issue dates and the prevalence/incidence of COVID-19 cases. METHODS: To make these comparisons, this exploratory qualitative study used document analysis of government guidelines issued to the general public and to healthcare professionals. Documents were purposively sampled (N = 55) and analyzed using content analysis. RESULTS: The major differences in the evaluation and testing criteria in the guidelines across the six countries centered around the priority of testing for COVID-19 in the general population, which was strongly dependent on each country's healthcare capacity. However, the most similar guidelines pertained to the clinical signs and symptoms of COVID-19, and methods to prevent its contraction. CONCLUSION: In the initial stages of the outbreak, certain strategies were universally employed to control the deadly virus's spread, including quarantining the sick, contact tracing, and social distancing. However, each country dealt with differing healthcare capacities, risks, threats, political and socioeconomic challenges, and distinct healthcare systems and infrastructure. Acknowledging these differences highlights the importance of examining the various countries' response to the COVID-19 pandemic with a nuanced view, as each of these factors shaped the government guidelines distributed to each country's communities and healthcare systems.