Five Essential Elements of Immediate and Mid-Term Mass Trauma Intervention: Empirical Evidence

Psychological first aid intervention: rescue from psychological distress and improving the pre-licensure nursing students' resilience amidst COVID-19 crisis and beyond

Background

The public health emergencies such as the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in mental and psychological ramifications on the healthcare professionals. The pre-licensure nursing students found themselves not only fighting against the baneful virus but also weak ego resilience. At this point, enriching the pre-licensure nursing students with psychological first aid (PFA) could help them to recover from the feeling of psychological distress and improve their resilience capacity to encounter any upcoming outbreaks.

Methods

A quasi-experimental two groups, a pre-post-test study was used in which sixty-four pre-licensure nursing students completed a baseline survey which revealed high levels of psychological distress and low resilience capacity due to the COVID-19 crisis. The study group engaged in the Psychological First- aid Intervention (PFA) at the end of the clinical practicum course period, while the comparison group received routine psychological support.

Results

A significant reduction in the psychological distress levels among students in the PFA group (F^ET=7.83, P = 0. 001). Likewise, significant improvements in the students' resilience capacity level immediately after the intervention (F^ET=3.34, P = 0.019) and during the two-month follow-up (F^ET=12.94, P = 0. 001). The implementation of PFA enhanced the pre-licensure nursing students' psychological health status and resilience capacity levels after their clinical training amid the ambiance of the COVID-19 crisis.

Conclusion

The PFA effectively fostered the pre-licensure nursing students' recovery from the COVID-19 related- psychological distress and improve their resilience capacity. The application of RAPID model is recommended to reduce stress and prevent burnout among novice and future nurses who show signs of psychological exhaustion.

The needs of cancer patients during the COVID-19 pandemic-psychosocial, ethical and spiritual aspects-systematic review

The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in unprecedented changes in the functioning of the health care system, which were connected with the occurrence of new challenges for both the health care system's employees and for the patients. The purpose of the present article is to analyze the needs of persons with oncological diseases. Taking into account the multiple aspects of the term health, psychological, social, and existential needs of the patients were analyzed. This article is directed mainly at persons who remain in a direct therapeutic relation with a patient. It is to facilitate recognizing the needs of ill people and to increase sensitivity to the issue of maintaining or improving the well-being of patients which requires paying special attention to their psychological, social, and existential needs during the period of hindered access to the health care system. This systematic review takes advantage of quantitative and qualitative methods of text analysis with phenomenological analysis factored in. The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in the appearance of new problems in the population of oncological patients or it made the existing problems more severe. As a consequence, it made it significantly more difficult to meet their needs on various levels and sometimes it even made it impossible. It seems necessary to determine and introduce strategies to ensure that patients with oncological diseases have access to psychological and spiritual support in the period of the pandemic.