Stress and Moral Distress in Health Care Workers During the Covid-19 Pandemic

Our mission is to create awareness of the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on Colorado’s healthcare workers and to develop a toolkit for healthcare workers to identify and address burnout, moral distress, and traumatic stress responses in themselves, their colleagues, and the healthcare systems in which they provide care.

In these unprecedented times, Covid-19 has brought uncertainty, frustration, fear and exhaustion to healthcare workers (HCWs) across all settings.  Many are called upon to care for large numbers of Covid-19 patients without proper testing or PPE.  HCWs face significant challenges when considering how best to treat patients or how to keep themselves and their loved ones safe during this potentially life threatening illness.  Additionally, HCWs have to navigate how to triage potentially scarce resources such as ventilators and how to triage medications that have already been in shortage during this pandemic.    

We have watched our colleagues get sick and die.

We have watched the people we are charged to care for get sick and die, often alone.

We have watched the politicization of this pandemic where topics such as mask wearing and potential treatments have become politically charged.

In addition to the specific challenges that are unique to our profession, we also confront serious stresses that are burdening the general population, such as how to arrange childcare, keep our families safe and healthy, cope with limited financial resources, support our loved ones through their concerns, and mourn our family and friends who have become ill or died during this time. 

The end result is that there has been a significant impact on the well being and mental health of HCWs.

Some HCWs are leaving healthcare. Some HCWs are still exhausted and not shored up for the next expected surge of Covid-19.  Mental health providers report large increases in the numbers of HCWs seeking help and reporting suicidal thoughts and there are concerns for the long term impacts on the workforce of HCWs once the pandemic subsides. Of great concern are first-time psychiatric hospitalizations, suicidal thoughts, and death by suicide of healthcare providers. 

There are many resources available for healthcare workers.  We recognize that different facilities may have limited access to resources and that some HCWs work alone. Though all of these options are not feasible for all settings, we hope to provide a resource of possibilities to help with the serious problem of stress and moral distress and the mental health consequences during Covid-19.