Addressing Psychosocial, Organizational, and Environmental Stressors Emerging from the COVID-19 Pandemic and their Effect on Essential Workers’ Mental Health and Wellbeing: A Literature Review

Details

• Alternative Title:
  J Occup Environ Med
• Personal Author:
  Woods, Elizabeth H. ; Zhang, Ying ; Roemer, Enid Chung ; Kent, Karen B. ; Davis, Meghan F. ; Goetzel, Ron Z.
• Description:
  Objective:
  
  To identify stressors faced by essential workers amid the COVID-19 pandemic and effective interventions mitigating these stressors.
  
  Methods:
  
  We reviewed literature on psychosocial, organizational, and environmental stressors faced by essential workers during the pandemic, the consequences of those stressors, and interventions to improve worker health and wellbeing.
  
  Findings:
  
  Stressors included elevated risk of COVID-19 exposure, fear of spreading the virus, lack of social and organizational supports, and financial insecurity. Negative outcomes included burnout, depression, and high turnover. Promising interventions included robust safety protocols, increased wages, childcare benefits, enhanced access to mental health services, and frequent leadership communications.
  
  Conclusion:
  
  Stress has taken a heavy toll on essential workers’ physical and emotional health, productivity, and job satisfaction. To effectively protect Total Worker Health®, employers should adopt evidence-based interventions promoting psychosocial, organizational, and environmental health and safety.
  
  
• Subjects:
  Burnout, Professional COVID-19 Emotions Health Personnel Humans Mental Health Pandemics
• Keywords:
  COVID-19 Pandemic Essential Worker Health Essential Worker Safety Occupational Interventions Psychosocial Organizational And Environmental Stressors Workplace Interventions Workplace Mental Health And Wellbeing Work Related Stress
• Source:
  J Occup Environ Med. 65(5):419-427
• Pubmed ID:
  36701793
• Pubmed Central ID:
  PMC10171099
• Document Type:
  Journal Article
• Funding:
  U19 OH012297/OH/NIOSH CDC HHSUnited States/
• Volume:
  65
• Issue:
  5
• Collection(s):
  CDC Public Access
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:54476d4823cba97633c33396c41586e5da55e9b0d93c77c0431da7bcde76a62b705c4f0947169179fe31e7a2067f63a6002825524b27ec9bce7913d1fe848859
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/128331/cdc_128331_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 665.07 KB ]