Depression, anxiety, stress among ASHA workers, in selected primary health centres in Southern Bengaluru

Abstract

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic was caused by a novel corona virus first discovered in Wuhan, December 2019. The healthcare system in India was quickly overwhelmed as tens of thousands of people with flu-like symptoms swarmed the hospitals.Methods: The present community based cross-sectional study was conducted among the accredited social health activist (ASHA) workers working under the selected primary health centres from August 2020 to November 2020. Primary health centres were selected by using simple random sampling technique. Three primary health centres were selected from the southern region of Bengaluru. The data was collected, compiled and entered into a Microsoft excel worksheet and analyzed using statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) software v.22.0. Descriptive statistics and suitable tests of significance like Chi-square test were applied as required.Results: A total of 78 ASHA workers participated in the present study. Majority of them belonged to the age group of 33-44 years. The mean age of the participants was 34 (+1.390) years. The present study showed that, 56.5% of the study participants experienced depression, anxiety or stress during the time of COVID-19 pandemic. Around 65% of the ASHA and Anganwadi workers were aware of the personal prophylactic measures to be used to prevent COVID-19 disease according to the present study.Conclusions: A significant proportion (56.5%) of the ASHA workers experienced depression, anxiety and stress during this pandemic. Measures should be undertaken to address the same.