Emotional impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the nursing staff: a cross-sectional study

Objective: The aim of this cross-sectional study is the emotional impact and the sleeping quality symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic in nurses and auxiliary nursing care technicians. Methods: The emotional impact was measured with the SA-45 questionnaire and the quality of sleep with the Oviedo sleep questionnaire (COS) taking a sample of nurses and auxiliary nursing care technicians (N = 247) in the services they attended to COVID patients (ICU, emergencies, hospitalization plants, provincial rehabilitation institute and palliative plant) of the Gregorio Maranon Hospital. Results: Higher mean scores have been found for the somatization categories (M: 1,65; DT: 1,08) depression (M: 1,68; DT: 1,01), anxiety (M: 1,54; DT: 0,97), obsession, compulsion (M: 1,4; DT: 0,99) and insomnia (M: 24,51; DT: 7,45) The services with the highest scores being the ICU, the IPR, the emergency department, the hospitalization floors and the palliative unit. TCAES women are more vulnerable than nurses, and temporary workers than permanent ones. No differences have been found for marital status, age or seniority or the number of days caring for COVID patients. Conclusion: Nursing staff have been physically and emotionally exposed to the pandemic. The deaths of patients, the fear of contagion and the workload have been some of the causes of the psychological discomfort that they now present and that should not be neglected in order to guarantee their emotional well-being and in this way provide higher quality care.