Post traumatic stress symptoms, anxiety, and depression in patients after intensive care unit discharge – a longitudinal cohort study from a LMIC tertiary care centre

AbstractLack of established knowledge and treatment strategies, and change in work environment, may altogether critically affect the mental health and functioning of physicians treating COVID-19 patients. Thus, we examined whether treating COVID-19 patients affect the physicians’ mental health differently compared with physicians treating non-COVID-19 patients. In this cohort study, an association was blindly computed between physiologically measured anxiety and attention vigilance (collected from 1 May 2014 to 31 May 31 2016) and self-reports of anxiety, mental health aspects, and sleep quality (collected from 20 April to 30 June 2020, and analyzed from 1 July to 1 September 2020), of 91 physicians treating COVID-19 or non-COVID-19 patients. As a priori hypothesized, physicians treating COVID-19 patients showed a relative elevation in both physiological measures of anxiety (95% CI: 2317.69–2453.44 versus 1982.32–2068.46; P < 0.001) and attention vigilance (95% CI: 29.85–34.97 versus 22.84–26.61; P < 0.001), compared with their colleagues treating non-COVID-19 patients. At least 3 months into the pandemic, physicians treating COVID-19 patients reported high anxiety and low quality of sleep. Machine learning showed clustering to the COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 subgroups with a high correlation mainly between physiological and self-reported anxiety, and between physiologically measured anxiety and sleep duration. To conclude, the pattern of attention vigilance, heightened anxiety, and reduced sleep quality findings point the need for mental intervention aimed at those physicians susceptible to develop post-traumatic stress symptoms, owing to the consequences of fighting at the forefront of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Psychological treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression following major physical civilian trauma: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Trauma ◽

10.1177/14604086211026104 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 146040862110261

Author(s):

Arham Qureshi ◽

Edward Dickenson ◽

Peter Wall

Keyword(s):

Usual Care ◽

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder ◽

Traumatic Stress ◽

Anxiety And Depression ◽

Wait List ◽

Post Traumatic Stress ◽

Psychological Treatments ◽

Civilian Trauma ◽

Post Traumatic ◽

Better Than

Introduction Approximately 16% of the world’s burden of disease is attributable to traumatic injury. Psychological symptoms, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), are prevalent in this population and impact recovery from physical injury. Nevertheless, mental health has not been considered to the same degree as physical health. Psychological interventions are used widely as treatments for PTSD. Methods Systematic searches of computerised databases were conducted. Randomised controlled trials of psychological treatments for PTSD following major physical civilian trauma were included. The main outcome measure was clinician-assessed symptoms of PTSD (CAPS), with findings for anxiety and depression also reported. Included studies data were extracted and entered using RevMan 5.3 software. Quality assessments were performed, and data were analysed for summary effects. Results 10 studies were included. With regard to CAPS <6 months, individual CBT did significantly better than usual care/wait list (SMD (95% CI) = −1.24 [−1.82, −0.67]) and non-CBT treatments (SMD (95% CI) = −1.32 [−2.64, −0.04]). Non-CBT treatments were not significantly better than usual care/wait list (SMD (95% CI) −1.40 [−2.91, 0.11]). CBT was superior to usual care/wait list for reducing depressive (SMD (95% CI) −0.67 [−0.98, −0.37]) and anxiety (SMD (95% CI) −0.70 [−1.22, −0.18]) symptoms both in the shorter and longer term. Conclusion Individual CBT was superior to wait list/usual care, and there was limited evidence for non-CBT treatments in reducing clinician and self-rated PTSD, depressive and anxiety symptoms in the shorter term; however, the latter comparison was based on few studies with small sample sizes. Longer-term effects of treatments remain uncertain. There is a need for adequately powered RCTs investigating PTSD treatments following major physical civilian trauma in the longer term. There was considerable heterogeneity in the studies, so care must be taken in interpreting the results of this review.

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