Mothers' and Children's Mental Health During the COVID-19 Pandemic Lockdown: The Mediating Role of Parenting Stress.

The present study, carried out during the first peak of the COVID-19 outbreak in Italy, aimed at investigating the mental health of mothers and children during the nationwide lockdown. More specifically, the study investigated children's depression and mothers' individual distress and parenting stress, in comparison with normative samples. The mediating effect of mothers' parenting stress on the relationship between mothers' individual distress and children's depression was also explored. Finally, the study analyzed whether children's biological sex and age moderated the structural paths of the proposed model. A sample of 206 Italian mothers and their children completed an online survey. Mothers were administered self-report questionnaires investigating individual distress and parenting stress; children completed a standardized measure of depression. Mothers' individual distress and parenting stress and children's depression were higher than those recorded for the normative samples. Mothers' parenting stress was found to mediate the association between mothers' individual distress and children's depression. With respect to children, neither biological sex nor age emerged as significant moderators of this association, highlighting that the proposed model was robust and invariant. During the current and future pandemics, public health services should support parents-and particularly mothers-in reducing individual distress and parenting stress, as these are associated with children's depression.

Psychological effects of the COVID-2019 pandemic: Perceived stress and coping strategies among healthcare professionals.

Starting from China, the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) contagion spread unexpectedly and quickly all over the world, particularly affecting Italy. In the early stages of the epidemic, healthcare professionals have been in the front-line to manage the infection. The current study aimed to analyse the impact of COVID-19 outbreak on healthcare professionals and to detect some risk and protective factors of their distress levels, with regard to socio-demographic variables, direct exposure to COVID-19 and the coping strategies used to deal with stress. The data were collected during the peak of the infection. A total of 595 healthcare professionals enrolled in the study and completed the measures of socio-demographical and professional data, perceived stress (PSS) and coping strategies (COPE- NVI-25). Overall, we found that a positive attitude towards the stressful situation was the main protective factor, while female gender, seeking social support, avoidance strategies and working with COVID-19 patients were risk factors. Economic status, problem solving ability and turning to religion were not associated with stress levels. This study, one of the first on this topic, highlighted the main coping strategies used by healthcare professionals in facing the highly stressful situation caused by the pandemic.

Psychological Adjustment of Healthcare Workers in Italy during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Differences in Stress, Anxiety, Depression, Burnout, Secondary Trauma, and Compassion Satisfaction between Frontline and Non-Frontline Professionals.

Emergency situations have been associated with negative psychological adjustment outcomes in healthcare professionals, although studies on the impact of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic amongst Italian health workers are limited. The main aim of this study was to investigate the psychological adjustment of healthcare professionals during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, evaluating differences according to working or not with patients affected by COVID-19 and in areas with a more severe spread of this pandemic. Healthcare professionals' attitudes toward psychological support were analyzed. The levels of anxiety, depression, psychological stress, and professional quality of life (compassion satisfaction, burnout, and compassion fatigue) and attitudes toward psychological support were measured among 627 Italian healthcare workers (mean age = 40.55 years; SD = 11.49; range: 27-72). Significantly higher levels of stress, burnout, secondary trauma, anxiety, and depression were observed among professionals working with COVID-19 patients. Higher levels of stress and burnout and lower levels of compassion satisfaction were detected in professionals working in areas with higher rates of contagion. No interaction effects were found between working (or not) with patients affected by COVID-19 and working (or not) in areas with a more severe diffusion of this pandemic. Finally, in the group of professionals who worked with COVID-19 patients, the percentage of professionals who thought to ask for psychological support was twice that of the group that did not work with COVID-19 patients. The overall findings indicate that the mental health of frontline healthcare workers requires further consideration and that targeted prevention and intervention programs are necessary.