COVID-19 Haunts Healthcare Workers at Bedtime. How Is Your Staff Sleeping?

Every American is under additional stress these days, whether it’s due to having to adapt to a new way of working, the strain of social isolation, worry over an at-risk family member, or illness itself. That burden is multiplied for urgent care providers and other clinicians, of course, as they’re on the frontlines of the crisis. An article just published in the journal Sleep and Breathing suggests there is a causal link between COVID-19 and poorer quality of sleep among healthcare workers—including both clinicians and office staff. Researchers used the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index and the Perceived Stress Scale to assess for sleep disturbances and stress levels among 257 healthcare workers from facilities of the Ministry of Health in Bahrain. Both frontline and nonfrontline workers exhibited high levels of poor sleep quality (75% for frontline and 76% for nonfrontline staff); moderate-to-severe stress (85% and 84%, respectively); and comorbid sleep quality and moderate–severe  stress (61% and 62%). The authors suggested that preventive interventions “are warranted” during the pandemic. As JUCM readers know, inadequate sleep has been linked to burnout among urgent care providers—something clinicians and urgent care centers cannot afford in the midst of a global pandemic. To learn more about warding off burnout, read Recognizing and Preventing Provider Burnout in Urgent Care in our archives.