Work Related Stress among Physicians Working in Primary Health Care Centers in Taif City, Saudi Arabia, 2020

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Background: Stress levels among healthcare professionals including doctors are high compared with the general working population because the work is characterized by high degree of responsibility and medical errors can have catastrophic effects on both the medical professional and the patient. Objectives: To assess psychosocial stress and its association with socio-demographic characteristics and work demands of physicians. Subject and methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study design was adopted among all physicians working at primary healthcare centers (PHCCs), Ministry of Health (MOH) in Taif during the period February-April, 2020. Assessment of Psychosocial Stress: was investigated by the Reeder scale. Work characteristics were investigated with the Karasek scale. Results: The study included 103 PHC physicians. The age of more than half of them (59.4%) ranged between 30 and 39 years. More than half of them (55.3%) were males. High psychological stress was observed among 29.1% of the participants. It was reported among more than half of the participants (55%) aged ≤29 years compared to 17.9% of those aged ≥40 years, p=0.022. Half of single physicians compared to 24.7% of married expressed high level of psychological stress, p=0.022. Almost one third of general practitioners (32.8%) compared to 16.7% of consultants had high level of psychological stress, p=0.046. Physicians who practiced less than 5 years were more likely to have psychological stress compared to those practiced >10 years (40.5% versus 20.7%), p=0.025. The percentage of the Karasek scale for work characteristics ranged between 30.6 and 75 with a mean±SD of 59.7±7.7 and median (Interquartile range) of 55.6 (61.1-63.9). It was abnormally distributed as evidenced from significant Shapiro-Wilk test, pConclusion: Psychological work-related stress is a common problem affecting primary healthcare physicians, Ministry of Health in Taif, Saudi Arabia. It was not significantly associated with work demands, although, its rate increase with increasing in work demands.