Perceived Stress Among ICU Medical Staff During COVID-19 Crisis

Well-being of caregivers and stress management in intensive care units are essential keys to an adequate quality of care, especially during the anxious context of coronavirus pandemic. Taking care of numerous patients, the increasing work and mental charges, facing death, the need of material and changes in work organization are all elements that can influence stress among medical workers. Considering real causes of stress and what are the needs of the medical team is fundamental for developing concrete actions to ease the workloads. A few studies were conducted in China on psychological distress of medical staff during COVID-19. According to these few studies about psychological distress in ICU, investigators think that stress scores during COVID-19 could be increased among nurses during pandemic. The second hypothesis is that causes of stress would be not so different from normal care but could be amplified by the actual situation. One point to take into consideration is that most of the studies were conducted in China and medical policy and hospital organization are different in Belgium. The objective of the study is to compare psychological distress and needs of nurses in ICU before and during coronavirus pandemic.

Inclusion criteria

• Adults > 18 years old
• working in ICU for at least November 2019
• working in ICU regularly since March 2020
• Medical and paramedical professionals
• Working in direct contact with COVID patients

Exclusion criteria

• Medical professionals from others departments
• Internship students
• External volunteers for COVID
• Non front-line nurses