Psychosocial Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Healthcare Professionals in Spain

Abstract

In December 2019, a new virus called SARS-CoV-2 appeared, and the disease it produced was named COVID-19. After the pandemic situation was declared by the World Health Organization in March 2020, an increasing worsening of the mental health of the population, especially healthcare professionals, became apparent. To determine the psychosocial impact of the pandemic on healthcare professionals in Spain, a longitudinal study was conducted at two time points separated by 5 weeks (n time 1 = 169; n time 2 = 65). Participants completed an online questionnaire assessing depression, anxiety, and stress (Depression Anxiety Stress Scale, DASS-21), burnout (Maslach Burnout Inventory—MBI), resilience (Brief Resilience Scale—BRS), and health-related quality of life (SF-36 Health Questionnaire). The results showed high levels of depression, anxiety, stress, and burnout, as well as moderate levels of resilience and low levels of quality of life at the first assessment. Resilience was negatively related to negative experiences, and positively related to the quality of life, also at the first assessment. Overall, there was an improvement in the mental health of healthcare professionals when comparing the two assessments. In this improvement, having COVID-19 in the first assessment had a positive effect on perceived mental health in the second assessment.