Implementation of A Psychiatric Consultation for Healthcare Workers During First Wave of COVID-19 Outbreak: A Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis.

Abstract Background:Prevention and management strategies of mental suffering in healthcare workers appeared as important challenges during COVID-19 pandemic. This article aims to 1) Identify potential psychiatric disorders for healthcare workers during the first wave of the COVID-19 outbreak; 2) Describe the implementation of a psychiatric consultation for healthcare workers; 3) Present the activity report of this consultation; 4) Analyze and learn from this experience.Methods: The authors identified specific risks for healthcare workers mental health to be anxiety, depression, burnout and traumatic symptoms. The authors performed a retrospective quantitative analysis of socio-demographic and clinical data, in addition to psychiatric scales scores for the main potential psychiatric risks (PDI, PDEQ, PCL-5, HADS, MBI-HSS) and post-hoc qualitative analysis of written interviews. Means and frequencies were calculated for all the variables collected. Results: 25 healthcare workers were consulted between 19 th March 2020 and 12 th June 2020, 18 who accepted to participate to the study. Authors found 78.57% presented high peritraumatic dissociation, 78.57%, high peritraumatic distress, 68.75%, severe anxiety symptoms, and 31.25%, severe depression symptoms. Concerning burnout, authors found 35.29% had a moderate,and 23.53% a high level of Emotional Exhaustion; 17.65%, a moderate, and 23.53%, a high level of Depersonalization; 11.76%, a low, and 35.29%, a moderate level of Personal Achievement. In the qualitative analysis of the written interview, authors found a direct link with COVID-19, primarily concerning traumatic stressors, and secondarily with work-related stress. Conclusions: This study confirms the psychiatric consequences during the first wave of the COVID-19 epidemic for healthcare workers. These results suggest that for healthcare workers, early detection of traumatic reactions, valorization of individual effort, and limitations on work overload, are potential key preventative measures.