Psychological Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Emergency Dental Care Providers on the Front Lines in China

Abstract

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an infectious disease that emerged at the end of 2019. On 30 January 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) classified it as a pandemic. To examine the psychological effects on dental care providers in China in the midst of the COVID-19 outbreak and factors closely associated with those effects, we conducted a cross-sectional study online with 4 widely used self-administered questionnaires: the Patient Health Questionnaire-9, the General Anxiety Disorder-7, the Perceived Stress Scale-10, and the Acute Stress Disorder Scale. Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed to evaluate the variables that potentially affected the mental health of emergency dental care providers. As a result, 969 out of 1035 questionnaires were included in the analysis, with 642 respondents reporting more than 1 symptom (66.3%). The symptom of perceived stress was reported by the largest proportion of the respondents (66.2%, n = 641), and anxiety the least (7.1%, n = 69). After adjustment for confounders, it was found that dental practitioners with preexisting physical health conditions were at higher risk of depression (odds ratio [OR], 1.972; 95% CI, 1.128-3.448; P = .017), and perceived stress (odds ratio, 2.397 95% CI, 1.283-4.478; P = .006). Additionally, feelings of fear, helplessness, or terror resulting from the possibility of contracting COVID-19 were significantly associated with the prevalence of all the 4 psychological symptoms observed (P < .05). In the present study, we found that dental care providers suffered psychological depression, stress, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) during COVID-19, which indicates the importance of psychological support at times of major epidemic outbreaks.Chinese Clinical Trial Registry number: ChiCTR2000031538.