Psychological Effects of COVID-19 on Nurses in Kuwait Hospitals & The Efficiency of Coping Mechanism Including Graduate from Nursing Institute

By the end of November 2020, the total death of COVID-19 in Kuwait hospitals reached 880 persons in a country of 4.137 million population comparing to 1.46 million death word wide. This pandemic has rapidly and profoundly affected every part of daily life, from the way people work, live, shop, socialize, and plan for future. In this battle, nurses were the big fighter against this enemy and went through tremendous psychological & physical pressure, working long shifts and often not provided with adequate emotional support (Veenema& Meyer,2020) under these conditions, the WHO recognizes the importance of nurse’s mental health and well- being. Therefore, nurses need supportive psychological interventions to promote emotional release and improve their mental health, hoping to overcome this stage safely with sturdy psychological health.Purpose: In this study, I am trying to highlight the level of the psychological impact of this event on our staff nurses in Kuwait hospitals& the efficiency of their coping mechanism during this pandemic with special consideration to the reaction of graduate nurses from Kuwait nursing institute.Method: In this quantitative method survey, an online questionnaire using Google Form was distributed through the head of the department in designated hospitals for COVID-19 between November 7 and 16 -2020 snowball sampling technique was also encouraged, a total of 187 nurses were responded in this sample, uncompleted questionnaires were excluded.The questionnaire included four main sections, social- demographic information, occupational & work history, general health questionnaire (GHQ-12), and a simplified copping style scale.A consent form was available pre- to filling the survey, Participant could withdraw at any point they wish even after an agreement to start.Results: A total of 181 participants attended the study, 79.6% Female while 20.4% were Male 30identified as having psychological distress.151 were without destress, univariate analysis revealed that there is significant difference in nationality, job role, working years, effectiveness of available precautionary measures, being treated differently because of working in hospital & being in contact with covid-19 cases between the two groups. Number of Kuwaiti staff without destress is less than their number with destress.For the two types of copping style, the mean avoidant coping of those with distress (2.49) was higher than that without distress (2.07) this difference was statistically significant where p=0.00Approach coping for the destress group is higher than approach coping of the non-distress group, Approach coping for our institute graduate was higher than the avoidant coping.Conclusions: Our staff nurses in Kuwait hospitals have a low psychological effect due to COVID-19 outbreak with variable coping style, our nursing institute graduate experience allow psychological effect & a positive coping mechanism. coping style is divided to approach & avoidant style, approach style is much stronger. Keywords: COVID-19- Pandemic – nurses- nursing institute graduate- Psychological distress- Coping style DOI: 10.7176/JHMN/91-02 Publication date:July 31st 202