Prediction and prevention of burnout syndrome in health care professionals in high epidemic risk settings

Nurses have been one of the most vulnerable categories of health workers with regard to occupational stress, professional burnout (PB), anxiety, coping strategies application, reduced quality of life in the situation of high epidemiological risk in the period of COVID-19 novel coronavirus infection (NCI) pandemic. Objective. To determine the features of professional burnout and life quality of the nurses working in «red zone» in a multi-specialty hospital and polyclinic during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus epidemic. Materials and methods. The study was carried out at the department of occupational diseases and clinical pharmacology named after honored scientist of the Russian Federation, professor V.V. Kosarev of the Samara State Medical University and the regional center of occupational pathology — «Samara City Hospital №5». The following groups of nurses were examined: the 1st group (n=29) — nurses working in the «red zone»; the 2nd group (n=31) — nurses working in a multi-specialty hospital; the 3rd group (n=29) — nurses working in polyclinic. The 4th group (control) included workers of engineering technical and economical specialties that are not related to work in medical organizations (n=190). Evaluation of PB syndrome was performed using the «Maslach Burnout» inventory, developed by American psychologists, namely C. Maslach, S.E. Jackson in the adaptation by N.E. Vodopyanova, E.S. Starchenkova as well as the V.V. Boiko questionnaire. Life quality was determined using the SF-36 questionnaire. Processing of obtained data was carried out using the Statistica package («StatSoft Inc.», USA). Results. It has been established that work of nurses during the COVID-19 epidemic is associated with the impact of a number of specific risk factors on health workers caused by providing medical care to infected patients, as well as by significant changes in work related to organization and safety. The influence of the studied risk factors leads to an increase in the level of professional stress, intensification of PB, decrease in life quality. Conclusion. The work of nurses in COVID-hospital conditions is related to higher level of professional stress and burnout, decrease in life quality when compared with the work of nurses in a multi-specialty hospital and polyclinic. Research on the emotional state of nurses should be continued in order to timely perform preventive measures for health preservation in this medical professionals’ category.