Investigating the relationship between social support and COVID-related anxiety among medical staff

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Student Research Committee, Department of Social Work, University of Social Welfare and Rehabilitation Sciences, Tehran, Iran.

2 Assistant professor of psychiatry, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Research Center, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran.

10.22038/JFMH.2024.83137.3177

Abstract

Introduction: The prevalence of the coronavirus led to anxiety caused by this disease in the hospital medical staff. This research aims to know the relationship between social support and anxiety caused by Corona among the medical staff.
 
Materials and Methods: The statistical population of this descriptive-correlational study included the medical staff involved in the Corona wards of Ghaem Hospital in Mashhad in 2020. Total of 100 staff were selected by the convenient sampling method. The participants fulfilled the Sarason Social Support Questionnaire and the Corona Disease Anxiety Scale. We analyzed the data using Pearson's correlation coefficient and regression analysis.
 
Results: The correlation test and regression analysis results indicate that the number of support networks significantly negatively affects anxiety levels related to the coronavirus (P= 0.02). Additionally, the likelihood of contracting the virus has a significant positive impact on anxiety levels caused by COVID-19 (P= 0.01). The adjusted R2 value suggests that social support can predict 8.6% of the variance in anxiety levels associated with COVID-19.
 
Conclusion: Regarding the strong link between social support networks and anxiety related to the coronavirus, it is advisable to increase awareness through education, media, and other channels about supporting healthcare workers.
 

Keywords

References

  1. Rezaeian M. [World and the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19)]. Journal of Rafsanjan University of Medical Sciences 2020; 19(1): 1-2. (Persian)
  2. Shahyad S, Mohammadi M. [Psychological impacts of Covid-19 outbreak on mental health status of society individuals A narrative review]. Journal of military medicine 2020; 22(2): 92-184. (Persian)
  3. Şimşir Z, Koç H, Seki T, Griffiths MD. The relationship between fear of COVID-19 and mental health problems: A meta-analysis. Death Stud 2022; 46(3): 515-23.
  4. Rahmanian MKA, Mosalanezhad H, Foroughian M, Kalani N, Hatami N, et al. [A comparative study on anxiety of medical and non-medical staff due to exposure and non-exposure‎ to the novel coronavirus disease]. Journal of Arak University of Medical Sciences 2020; 23(5): 710-23. (Persian)
  5. Liu Y, Zou L, Yan S, Zhang P, Zhang J, Wen J, et al. Burnout and post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms among medical staff two years after the COVID-19 pandemic in Wuhan, China: Social support and resilience as mediators. J Affect Disord 2023; 321: 126-33.
  6. Zhou T, Guan R, Sun L. Perceived organizational support and PTSD symptoms of frontline healthcare workers in the outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan: The mediating effects of self-efficacy and coping strategies. Appl Psychol Health Well Being 2021; 13(4): 745-60.
  7. Wu T, Jia X, Shi H, Niu J, Yin X, Xie J, et al. Prevalence of mental health problems during the COVID-19 pandemic: A systematic review and meta-analysis. J Affect Disord 2021; 281: 91-8.
  8. Heng C-N, Du J, Li L, Zhang N, Jiang W. Effect of insomnia on anxiety about COVID-19 patients: The mediating role of psychological capital. Research square 2024. (In press)
  9. Sirati Nir M, Karimi L, Khalili R. [The perceived stress level of health care and non-health care in exposed to COVID-19 pandemic]. Iranian journal of psychiatry and clinical psychology 2020; 26(3): 294-305.
  10. Lai J, Ma S, Wang Y, Cai Z, Hu J, Wei N, et al. Factors associated with mental health outcomes among health care workers exposed to coronavirus disease 2019. JAMA Netw Open 2020; 3(3): e203976.
  11. Zhao X, Zhang W, Su Y, Song Y, Si H, Zhu L. Death anxiety, self-esteem, and health-related quality of life among geriatric caregivers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Psychogeriatrics 2022; 22(2): 236-42.
  12. Salimi H, Shabani S. [The role of social support in predicting mood and anxiety symptoms (lack of pleasure, induced anxiety and general depression) of Iranian and foreign students]. Journal of counseling and psychotherapy 2013; 4: 35-57. (Persian)
  13. Karimi L, Makvandi S, Mahdavian M, Khalili R. [Relationship between social support and anxiety caused by COVID-19 in pregnant women]. The Iranian journal of obstetrics, gynecology and infertility 2020; 23(10): 9-17. (Persian)
  14. Gabarrell-Pascuet A, García-Mieres H, Giné-Vázquez I, Moneta MV, Koyanagi A, Haro JM, et al. The association of social support and loneliness with symptoms of depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress during the COVID-19 pandemic: A meta-analysis. Int J Environ Res Public Health 2023; 20(4): 2765.
  15. Akbarvand T, Mirhashemi M, Bashardoost S. [Investigating the structural relationships of Covid-19 disease anxiety based on cognitive flexibility with the mediating role of perceived social support in students]. Journal of Ardabil University of Medical Sciences 2021; 21(3): 295-308. (Persian)
  16. Birkeland MS, Blix I, Thoresen S. Trauma in the third decade: Ruminative coping, social relationships and posttraumatic stress symptoms. J Affect Disord 2021; 278: 601-6.
  17. Sarason IG, Levine HM, Basham RB, Sarason BR. Assessing social support: The Social Support Questionnaire. J Pers Soc Psychol 1983; 44(1): 127-39.
  18. Nasseh M, Ghazinour M, Joghataei MT, Nojomi M, Richter J. [A Persian version of the Social Support Questionnaire (SSQ)]. Social welfare 2011; 11: 251-66. (Persian)
  19. Alipour A, Ghadami A, Alipour Z, Abdollahzadeh H. [Preliminary validation of the Corona Disease Anxiety Scale (CDAS) in the Iranian sample]. Health psychology 2020; 8: 163-75. (Persian)
  20. Ahorsu DK, Lin CY, Imani V, Saffari M, Griffiths MD, Pakpour AH. The Fear of COVID-19 Scale: Development and initial validation. Int J Ment Health Addict 2022; 20(3): 1537-45.
  21. Qi J, Xu J, Li BZ, Huang JS, Yang Y, Zhang ZT, et al. The evaluation of sleep disturbances for Chinese frontline medical workers under the outbreak of COVID-19. Sleep Med 2020; 72: 1-4.
  22. Rahmani R, Sargazi V, Shirzaei Jalali M, Babamiri M. Relationship between COVID-19-caused anxiety and job burnout among hospital staff: A cross-sectional study in the southeast of Iran. Journal of occupational hygiene engineering 2021; 7(4): 61-9.
  23. Narimani M, Eyni S. [The causal model of coronavirus anxiety in the elderly based on perceived stress and sense of cohesion: The mediating role of perceived social support]. Aging psychology 2021; 7(1): 13-27. (Persian)
  24. Permatasari NAF, Ismail N. Contribution of perceived social support (peer, family, and teacher) to academic resilience during COVID-19. Golden ratio of social science and education 2021; 1(1): 1-12.
  25. Henry A, Tourbah A, Camus G, Deschamps R, Mailhan L, Castex C, Gout O, Montreuil M. Anxiety and depression in patients with multiple sclerosis: The mediating effects of perceived social support. Mult Scler Relat Disord 2019; 27: 46-51.
  26. Eyni S, Ebadi M, Hashemi Z. [Corona anxiety in nurses: The predictive role of perceived social support and sense of coherence]. Iranian journal of psychiatry and clinical psychology. 2020;26(3): 320-31. (Persian)
  27. Malta M, Rimoin AW, Strathdee SA. The coronavirus 2019-nCoV epidemic: Is hindsight 20/20? EClinicalMedicine 2020; 20: 100289.
  28. Malta M, Rimoin AW, Hoff NA, Strathdee SA. The 2019-nCoV pandemic in the global south: A Tsunami ahead. EClinicalMedicine 2020; 23: 100384.
Journal of Fundamentals of Mental Health
Volume 27, Issue 1
January and February 2025
Pages 1-6

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics