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

Reynolds, Allie; Jahromi, Alireza Hamidian

doi:10.1017/s1478951521000717

Cited by 6 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…This study also revealed that KBTH adopted a shift system. The result mirrors the findings previous studies ( Pastrana et al, 2021 ; Reynolds & Jahromi, 2021 ). Although this adaptation mechanism was timely for sustaining PC service delivery, it has some potential adverse implications.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Covid-19 Front-Liners: Experiences of Palliative Care Providers in a Tertiary Hospital

2022

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Introduction In “normal” times, palliative care (PC) service delivery is confronted with many challenges thereby making access to care difficult. Now, we are in the era of COVID-19 where the healthcare ecology is radically changed. During this process of radical transformation, there are some ramification of COVID-19 on PC service delivery. Yet, there is a paucity of empirical evidence to support this claim. Objective We explored PC providers’ perspectives on delivering PC services in the era of COVID-19. Methods Using an exploratory descriptive qualitative approach, we conducted face-to-face and telephone interviews with seven PC service providers at Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, Ghana. Haase's adaptation of Colaizzi's method was employed as the analysis strategy. Results Two main themes emerged: ramifications and adaptations. The ramifications of COVID-19 on PC service delivery included changes in care relationship, perceived increased responsibilities, psychological distress, shortage of medicines, and treatment delays. In an attempt to mitigate the challenges posed by COVID-19 on PC service delivery, the following mechanisms adaptations were made: halting of service provision, resorting to tele-consultation, adopting shift system and reducing number of appointments, and adoption of infection prevention and control strategies. Conclusions Our results indicate that COVID-19 has substantial ramification of PC service delivery. In conclusion, priority should be given to the training of healthcare workers on emergency preparedness for future pandemics. Also, continuous professional development would be needed in order build PC service providers’ skills and capacity to effectively utilize tele-consultation in PC service delivery.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Covid-19 Front-Liners: Experiences of Palliative Care Providers in a Tertiary Hospital

2022

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“…Although COVID-19 tweets decreased in number, PEoLC tweets reached their peak in December 2020, around the authorization of the COVID-19 vaccination programs, indicating that the public discussion about PEoLC responded to this policy. Other studies [ 31 , 77 ] have emphasized the importance of vaccination programs to PEoLC strategies during the pandemic, and our study supported this finding. In addition, our results indicated that the term “vaccine” was closely related to positive terms that included “thank,” “love,” “support,” “frontline,” and “proud” across all 3 countries after the implementation of the vaccination programs.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

“…Specifically, the primary objective was to identify the top PEoLC topics discussed by the public in English-speaking countries during the pandemic. Our secondary objective was to understand in what ways the social media discussions about PEoLC changed after the start of the vaccination program and understand to what extent the stated benefits of the vaccine were reflected in public discourse, particularly the protective effect on PEoLC health professionals and patients [31][32][33][34][35].…”

Section: Objectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public Opinions About Palliative and End-of-Life Care During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Twitter-Based Content Analysis

et al. 2023

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Background Palliative and end-of-life care (PEoLC) played a critical role in relieving distress and providing grief support in response to the heavy toll caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. However, little is known about public opinions concerning PEoLC during the pandemic. Given that social media have the potential to collect real-time public opinions, an analysis of this evidence is vital to guide future policy-making. Objective This study aimed to use social media data to investigate real-time public opinions regarding PEoLC during the COVID-19 crisis and explore the impact of vaccination programs on public opinions about PEoLC. Methods This Twitter-based study explored tweets across 3 English-speaking countries: the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada. From October 2020 to March 2021, a total of 7951 PEoLC-related tweets with geographic tags were retrieved and identified from a large-scale COVID-19 Twitter data set through the Twitter application programming interface. Topic modeling realized through a pointwise mutual information–based co-occurrence network and Louvain modularity was used to examine latent topics across the 3 countries and across 2 time periods (pre- and postvaccination program periods). Results Commonalities and regional differences among PEoLC topics in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada were identified specifically: cancer care and care facilities were of common interest to the public across the 3 countries during the pandemic; the public expressed positive attitudes toward the COVID-19 vaccine and highlighted the protection it affords to PEoLC professionals; and although Twitter users shared their personal experiences about PEoLC in the web-based community during the pandemic, this was more prominent in the United States and Canada. The implementation of the vaccination programs raised the profile of the vaccine discussion; however, this did not influence public opinions about PEoLC. Conclusions Public opinions on Twitter reflected a need for enhanced PEoLC services during the COVID-19 pandemic. The insignificant impact of the vaccination program on public discussion on social media indicated that public concerns regarding PEoLC continued to persist even after the vaccination efforts. Insights gleaned from public opinions regarding PEoLC could provide some clues for policy makers on how to ensure high-quality PEoLC during public health emergencies. In this post–COVID-19 era, PEoLC professionals may wish to continue to examine social media and learn from web-based public discussion how to ease the long-lasting trauma caused by this crisis and prepare for public health emergencies in the future. Besides, our results showed social media’s potential in acting as an effective tool to reflect public opinions in the context of PEoLC.

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“…Specific stressors occur as a result of caring for patients with complex physical conditions, and regular exposure to death, loss, and grief. In 2020-21, the COVID-19 pandemic led to increased stress and distress within the health and social care workforce [4][5][6][7][8] , including palliative care 9,10 . As a result of the pandemic, healthcare staff encountered rapidly changing clinical roles, new modes of service delivery and increased patient volumes, coupled with risk of infection.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Research Evaluating Staff Training Online for Resilience (RESTORE): Protocol for a single-arm feasibility study of an online Acceptance and Commitment Therapy intervention to improve staff wellbeing in palliative care settings

Finucane¹,

Hulbert‐Williams²,

Swash³

et al. 2022

AMRC Open Res

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Background: Palliative care staff commonly experience workplace stress and distress. General stressors include unmanageable workloads and staff shortages. Stressors specific to palliative care include regular exposure to death, loss and grief. The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated exhaustion and burnout across the healthcare system, including for those providing palliative care. Evidence based psychological support interventions, tailored to the needs and context of palliative care staff, are needed. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is an established form of cognitive behavioural therapy which uses behavioural psychology, values, acceptance, and mindfulness techniques to improve mental health and wellbeing. ACT is effective in improving workplace wellbeing in many occupational settings. Our study examines the acceptability and feasibility of an online ACT-based intervention to improve mental health and wellbeing in staff caring for people with an advanced progressive illness. Methods: A single-arm feasibility trial. We will seek to recruit 30 participants to take part in an 8- week online ACT-based intervention, consisting of three synchronous facilitated group sessions and five asynchronous self-directed learning modules. We will use convergent mixed methods to evaluate the feasibility of the intervention. Quantitative feasibility outcomes will include participant recruitment and retention rates, alongside completion rates of measures assessing stress, quality of life, wellbeing, and psychological flexibility. Focus groups and interviews will explore participant perspectives on the intervention. We will run a stakeholder workshop to further refine the intervention and identify outcomes for use in a future evaluation. Results: We will describe participant perspectives on intervention acceptability, format, content, and perceived impact, alongside rates of intervention recruitment, retention, and outcome measure completion. Conclusion: We will show whether a brief, online ACT intervention is acceptable to, and feasible for palliative care staff. Findings will be used to further refine the intervention and provide essential information on outcome assessment prior to a full-scale evaluation.

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

Cited by 6 publications

References 6 publications

Covid-19 Front-Liners: Experiences of Palliative Care Providers in a Tertiary Hospital

Covid-19 Front-Liners: Experiences of Palliative Care Providers in a Tertiary Hospital

Public Opinions About Palliative and End-of-Life Care During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Twitter-Based Content Analysis

Research Evaluating Staff Training Online for Resilience (RESTORE): Protocol for a single-arm feasibility study of an online Acceptance and Commitment Therapy intervention to improve staff wellbeing in palliative care settings

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