Members of the HEROES Research team recently published results from the HERO Registry on how the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic affected U.S. healthcare workers.
Launched in April 2020, the Healthcare Worker Exposure Response and Outcomes (HERO) research program is open to any adult who works in a healthcare setting. Individuals do not have to work directly with patients, but may have any role within a setting where individuals receive health care.
In this manuscript, initial results reflect enrollment of 14,600 healthcare workers who joined the HERO Registry from April to July 2020. The Registry has now grown to more than 25,000 members.
Key Results
In the results reported, the mean age of participants was 42.0 years, 76.4% were female, 78.9% were White, 33.2% were nurses, 18.4% were physicians, and 30.3% worked in settings at high risk for COVID-19 exposure (e.g., ICUs, EDs, COVID-19 units).
Results showed that 43.7% of participants reported exposure to someone with COVID-19, and 91.3% of those individuals were exposed at work. These high rates of exposure illustrate the safety risk that healthcare workers face in their daily work.
Black/African-American and Hispanic/Latino healthcare workers were twice as likely as Whites to experience COVID-19 illness, even after controlling for other demographic characteristics, including geographic region of residence, features of the work environment, and professional role. Though this study does not explain the reasons for these disparities, it does add support to other researchers’ calls to further examine and address COVID-19 race/ethnicity disparities.
Overall, 41% of participants responded that they were experiencing job burnout. The results show that healthcare workers reported some type of stress during the study period (53% of participants reported feeling tired a lot of the day, 51% stress, 41% trouble sleeping, 38% worry, 21% sadness, 19% physical pain, and 15% anger). The results also suggest that additional study is needed to understand how the pandemic is impacting female healthcare workers, as women were more likely than men to report distress feelings and burnout.
Conclusion
The authors conclude that while healthcare workers are at high risk for COVID-19 exposure, rates of COVID-19 illness among the study participants were low. The greater risk of COVID-19 infection among race/ethnicity minorities reported in the general population is also seen in healthcare workers.
The HERO research program is uniquely positioned to better understand changes in distress experiences over time and to conduct sub-studies on various issues. The HERO registry will continue to monitor changes in healthcare worker well-being during the pandemic.
If you are already a member of the HERO Registry, thank you! Healthcare workers who are not HERO members but are eager to participate in research opportunities to help us understand the impact of COVID-19 on frontline workers can join here.