Prevalence of COVID-19 testing among health workers providing care for suspected and confirmed cases

Factors associated with the SARS-CoV-2 infection among health professionals from university hospitals

to investigate factors associated with the SARS-CoV-2 infection among health professionals from university hospitals. a multicenter, mixed approach study with concomitant incorporated strategy, carried out with 559 professionals in the quantitative stage, and 599 in the qualitative stage. Four data collection instruments were used, applied by means of an electronic form. The quantitative analysis was performed with descriptive and inferential statistics and the qualitative data were processed by means of content analysis. the factors associated with the infection were as follows: performance of the RT-PCR test (p<0.001) and units offering care to COVID-19 patients (p=0.028). Having symptoms increased 5.63 times the prevalence of infection and adhering to social distancing most of the time in private life reduced it by 53.9%. The qualitative data evidenced difficulties faced by the professionals: scarcity and low quality of Personal Protective Equipment, work overload, physical distancing at work, inadequate processes and routines and lack of a mass screening and testing policy. the factors associated with the SARS-CoV-2 infection among health professionals were mostly related to occupational issues.

Lived Experiences of Nursing Professionals Providing Care to COVID-19 Patients

Objective: To analyze nursing professionals’ reports on their lived experience in the care provided to hospitalized patients with COVID-19. Materials and Methods: This is an exploratory study using a qualitative analysis, which included twelve nurses and eight nursing technicians from a public hospital in Brazil, conducted between December 2020 and February 2021. The inclusion criteria were professionals who provided care to COVID-19 patients in emergency, intensive care, and inpatient units and who had at least one year of experience in the institution. The interviews were analyzed through content and similarity analysis that generated a similarity tree; the Reinert method was used for thematic categories. Results: Most participants were female, with a mean age of 34.15 years and 4.85 years of experience. From the analysis, the words ‘patient,’ ‘to stay,’ and ‘to find’ were the most frequent, and for the categories, they were “nursing professionals’ feelings regarding the pandemic,” “the nurses’ role and work with the multi-professional team in the care provided to patients with COVID-19,” “precautions with the care provided to patients with COVID-19,” and “nursing professionals’ concern that their family members may become ill during the pandemic.” Conclusions: The nursing staff is predominantly composed of females and, in their reports on the lived experience of providing care to patients with COVID-19, they pointed out that concern and fear were prevalent, with the family being one of the protective factors to withstand the risks of working against something novel that may result in death.