Resilience, perceived social support and professional quality of life among medical social workers during COVID-19 pandemic in Mainland China: A cross-sectional survey

Abstract

ABSTRACT As COVID-19 rapidly overwhelmed the world in 2020, medical social workers have fought against the disease on the front lines as a member of medical teams, but little is known about the impact of the pandemic on their mental health. This study investigated the resilience, perceived social support and professional quality of life of medical social workers in Mainland China under the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic. An online questionnaire survey was applied to 319 respondents and the results showed that informal support was positively related with compassion satisfaction (r = 0.67, p < .01) and negatively correlated with job burnout (r = −0.51, p < .01) while formal support was positively associated with compassion satisfaction (r = 0.61, p < .01) and negatively associated with job burnout (r = −0.44. p < .01). Resilience was positively correlated with compassion satisfaction (r = 0.56, p < .01) and negatively correlated with job burnout (r = −0.49, p < .01). Nevertheless, neither perceived social support nor resilience was associated with secondary traumatic stress. The regression results further highlighted the role of informal social support on job burnout. Measures should be taken to enhance the professional quality of life for medical social workers during a public health crisis .