Purpose of Review We aim to provide quantitative evidence on the psychological impact of epidemic/pandemic outbreaks (i.e., SARS, MERS, COVID-19, ebola, and influenza A) on healthcare workers (HCWs). Recent Findings Forty-four studies are included in this review. Between 11 and 73.4% of HCWs, mainly including physicians, nurses, and auxiliary staff, reported post-traumatic stress symptoms during outbreaks, with symptoms lasting after 1-3 years in 10-40%. Depressive symptoms are reported in 27.5-50.7%, insomnia symptoms in 34-36.1%, and severe anxiety symptoms in 45%. General psychiatric symptoms during outbreaks have a range comprised between 17.3 and 75.3%; high levels of stress related to working are reported in 18.1 to 80.1%. Several individual and work-related features can be considered risk or protective factors, such as personality characteristics, the level of exposure to affected patients, and organizational support. Summary Empirical evidence underlines the need to address the detrimental effects of epidemic/pandemic outbreaks on HCWs' mental health. Recommendations should include the assessment and promotion of coping strategies and resilience, special attention to frontline HCWs, provision of adequate protective supplies, and organization of online support services.

We present the factor structure and psychometric properties of the Italian version of the SCL-90-R based on a large sample of the Italian population. The sample (N=3631) included high-school and university students and adults from the community (age range=13-70 yrs; 39.2% males). Principal component analysis (PCA) supported by parallel analysis, yielded eight components, partially overlapping those in the original version; no evidence of Psychoticism and Paranoid Ideation as separate subscales emerged. Twenty-one items were consecutively deleted, leading to a 69-item version of the scale. Internal coherence was good for all subscales (α values between 0.70 and 0.96). However, the eight-factor solution did not prove consistent when analyses were replicated after dividing the sample in subgroups according to gender and age. A second-order PCA yielded a single factor, supporting the adoption of the GSI as an index of general distress. A 69-item brief version of the scale has been empirically derived in this study, and can possibly be adopted as a screening measure for general distress in Italian adults and adolescents; however, caution should be exercised when interpreting the clinical profile due to the instability of factor structure.

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We argue that the series of traits characterizing Borderline Personality Disorder samples do not weigh equally. In this regard, we believe that network approaches employed recently in Personality and Psychopathology research to provide information about the differential relationships among symptoms would be useful to test our claim. To our knowledge, this approach has never been applied to personality disorders. We applied network analysis to the nine Borderline Personality Disorder traits to explore their relationships in two samples drawn from university students and clinical populations (N = 1317 and N = 96, respectively). We used the Fused Graphical Lasso, a technique that allows estimating networks from different populations separately while considering their similarities and differences. Moreover, we examined centrality indices to determine the relative importance of each symptom in each network. The general structure of the two networks was very similar in the two samples, although some differences were detected. Results indicate the centrality of mainly affective instability, identity, and effort to avoid abandonment aspects in Borderline Personality Disorder. Results are consistent with the new DSM Alternative Model for Personality Disorders. We discuss them in terms of implications for therapy.