“Making Sure We Are All Okay”: Healthcare Workers’ Strategies for Emotional Connectedness During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Bender, Anna E.; Berg, Kristen A.; Miller, Emily; Evans, Kylie; Holmes, Megan R.

doi:10.1007/s10615-020-00781-w

Cited by 46 publications

(36 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…Only scales with all items completed were considered and entered in the study for statistical analysis. Total scores were interpreted as follows: normal (0-8), mild (9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25), moderate (26)(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42)(43) and severe (44-88) post-traumatic symptomatology. Because the original IES-R instructions require respondents to refer to a specific stressful and potentially traumatic life event, our participants were instructed to respond with reference to any stressful event that happened to them at work in relation to the current pandemic (e.g.…”

Section: Post-traumatic Symptomatologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Therefore, a self-report measure of individual resilience was also included in our protocol, along with measures of perceived stress and subjective well-being. If SH+ improved such measures, its potential to serve also as a proactive intervention to boost resilience, increase well-being and decrease baseline perceived stress once the current pandemic has receded, and thus decrease the probability to develop psychological symptoms in a future emergency [ 23 , 24 ], should be further investigated.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effectiveness of self-help plus (SH+) in reducing anxiety and post-traumatic symptomatology among care home workers during the COVID-19 pandemic: a randomized controlled trial

et al. 2021

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This article describes a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the effectiveness of a supervised online delivery of self-help plus (SH+), during the second wave of COVID-19 contagions in Northern Italy. The SH+ is a psychological intervention developed by the World Health Organization to increase a person's ability to deal with stress. In this trial, it was tested primarily as a tool to reduce anxiety and post-traumatic symptomatology in workers of residential nursing and care homes. In order to partial out non-specific effects of the intervention, the SH+ was compared to an equally supervised and structured alternative activity. Secondarily, in view of future emergencies, the potential of SH+ as a tool to reduce perceived stress, increase subjective well-being and foster individual resilience was explored. At post-intervention, the preregistered analysis revealed no difference in self-reported anxiety and/or post-traumatic symptomatology between the group receiving the SH+ and the group engaged in an alternative activity. Some specific and positive effects of the SH+ intervention were only found on self-reported intervention effectiveness and engagement in exploratory analyses. These findings raise the question whether the previously documented effectiveness of the SH+ on self-reported symptomatology and on the prevention of psychiatric conditions could be attributed mostly to non-specific rather than specific factors connected with participant enrolment in a psychological intervention. Indeed, the effects of the SH+ had been previously compared only to the effects of not being engaged in any alternative activity (often described in the literature as ‘treatment as usual’—or ‘enhanced treatment as usual’, when some relevant information is given to the control group as a one-off). Given the negative findings of this study, before the SH+ is implemented in clinical practice, further studies should be conducted to examine its short- and long-term beneficial effects, by means of randomized studies that employ alternative but similarly structured interventions as control conditions, aiming to minimize the confounding effect of non-specific factors.

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Section: Post-traumatic Symptomatologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effectiveness of self-help plus (SH+) in reducing anxiety and post-traumatic symptomatology among care home workers during the COVID-19 pandemic: a randomized controlled trial

et al. 2021

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“…One way in which PCW can positively impact their mental health is by boosting emotional connectedness. A recent study described the relationship between emotional connectedness and mental health as well as a variety of strategies healthcare workers (HCWs) can use to stay emotionally connected with others during the pandemic (Bender et al, 2021 ). Since the pandemic has persisted and will continue to do so in the foreseeable future, boosting HCW's emotional connectedness needs to become a priority.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The impact of COVID-19 on palliative care workers across the world and measures to support their coping capacity

Reynolds

Jahromi

2021

Pall Supp Care

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“…To cancer survivors, Khng (2020) pointed out that it could be a double crisis because they were constantly reminded about death from both personal histories of cancer and news related to COVID-19 mortality. As frontline healthcare workers were navigating between the overwhelmed healthcare systems and affected patients, studies had been conducted to examine their mental health conditions (Nyashanu et al, 2020) and adaptive emotional connection strategies (Bender et al, 2021).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Responses to COVID-19 in Major Social Work Journals: A Systematic Review of Empirical Studies, Comments, and Editorials

Cheung

2021

Research on Social Work Practice

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Purpose: The main objective of this study was to provide a comprehensive overview of the latest studies on COVID-19related social work issues. Method: This systematic review aimed to collect, review, and synthesize all COVID-19related papers published in 43 major social work journals, a year after the first known case was reported. Results: The final sample ( n = 256) consisted of 85 research articles and 171 in other formats. All the studies involved a total of 46,195 research participants. The majority of papers (75.4%) could be accessed freely online. Service users including families, students, older adults, caregivers, refugees, patients, health care workers, etc. were either researched or discussed. Discussion: Gerontological social work was one of the fields that received ample attention. Papers published in the Journal of Gerontological Social Work yielded the highest number of citations. Academics and social workers came up with innovative ways of practicing and researching during the pandemic.

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“Making Sure We Are All Okay”: Healthcare Workers’ Strategies for Emotional Connectedness During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Cited by 46 publications

References 33 publications

Effectiveness of self-help plus (SH+) in reducing anxiety and post-traumatic symptomatology among care home workers during the COVID-19 pandemic: a randomized controlled trial

Effectiveness of self-help plus (SH+) in reducing anxiety and post-traumatic symptomatology among care home workers during the COVID-19 pandemic: a randomized controlled trial

The impact of COVID-19 on palliative care workers across the world and measures to support their coping capacity

Responses to COVID-19 in Major Social Work Journals: A Systematic Review of Empirical Studies, Comments, and Editorials

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