Sense of coherence, social support and religiosity as resources for medical personnel during the COVID-19 pandemic: A web-based survey among 4324 health care workers within the German Network University Medicine.

Publisher: Public Library of Science Country of Publication: United States NLM ID: 101285081 Publication Model: eCollection Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1932-6203 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 19326203 NLM ISO Abbreviation: PLoS One Subsets: MEDLINE

Original Publication: San Francisco, CA : Public Library of Science

Pandemics* ; Sense of Coherence* ; Social Support*; Anxiety/*psychology ; COVID-19/*psychology ; Depression/*psychology ; Stress, Psychological/*epidemiology; Adolescent ; Adult ; Anxiety/epidemiology ; COVID-19/epidemiology ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Depression/epidemiology ; Female ; Germany/epidemiology ; Health Personnel ; Health Promotion/statistics & numerical data ; Humans ; Logistic Models ; Male ; Mental Health ; Middle Aged ; Religion ; SARS-CoV-2/pathogenicity ; Stress, Psychological/physiopathology ; Surveys and Questionnaires

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in severe detrimental effects on the mental well-being of health care workers (HCW). Consequently, there has been a need to identify health-promoting resources in order to mitigate the psychological impact of the pandemic on HCW.
Objective: Our objective was to investigate the association of sense of coherence (SOC), social support and religiosity with self-reported mental symptoms and increase of subjective burden during the COVID-19 pandemic in HCW.
Methods: Our sample comprised 4324 HCW of four professions (physicians, nurses, medical technical assistants (MTA) and pastoral workers) who completed an online survey from 20 April to 5 July 2020. Health-promoting resources were assessed using the Sense of Coherence Scale Short Form (SOC-3), the ENRICHD Social Support Inventory (ESSI) and one item on religiosity derived from the Scale of Transpersonal Trust (TPV). Anxiety and depression symptoms were measured with the PHQ-2 and GAD-2. The increase of subjective burden due to the pandemic was assessed as the retrospective difference between burden during the pandemic and before the pandemic.
Results: In multiple regressions, higher SOC was strongly associated with fewer anxiety and depression symptoms. Higher social support was also related to less severe mental symptoms, but with a smaller effect size, while religiosity showed minimal to no correlation with anxiety or depression. In professional group analysis, SOC was negatively associated with mental symptoms in all groups, while social support only correlated significantly with mental health outcomes in physicians and MTA. In the total sample and among subgroups, an increase of subjective burden was meaningfully associated only with a weaker SOC.
Conclusion: Perceived social support and especially higher SOC appeared to be beneficial for mental health of HCW during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the different importance of the resources in the respective occupations requires further research to identify possible reasons.
Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

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Date Created: 20210726 Date Completed: 20210806 Latest Revision: 20210806

20240105

PMC8312980

10.1371/journal.pone.0255211

34310616