Racial & ethnic differences in mental health outcomes and risk factors among frontline healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic

OBJECTIVE

To examine racial/ethnic differences in mental health outcomes and risk factors during the COVID-19 pandemic among frontline healthcare workers (FHCWs).

METHODS

A survey was conducted on FHCWs at a large metropolitan hospital during winter 2021. Depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress symptoms, demographic characteristics, and COVID-19-related occupational factors were assessed. Multivariable logistic regression examined factors associated with screening positive for psychiatric symptoms and their interactions with race/ethnicity.

RESULTS

Of 1437 FHCWs, 762 (53.0%) self-identified as white, 451 (31.4%) as Asian, 118 (8.2%) as Black, and 106 (7.4%) as Latinx. Black FHCWs had a higher prevalence of screening positive for depression (18.6%) than other groups (6.6%-11.7%, p < .05). Significant risk factors by race/ethnicity interactions indicated that having cared for patients who died from COVID-19 increased risk of psychiatric symptoms among white and Black individuals, having to make difficult decisions prioritizing patients increased risk most significantly among white and Asian individuals, and working more hours increased risk most significantly among Latinx individuals.

CONCLUSION

Results suggest that occupational stressors may have differential impacts on mental health among racial/ethnic groups of FHCWs. Findings provide insight on subgroups with increased vulnerability to certain risk factors and inform interventions to improve mental health in diverse FHCWs.

[Oculo-orbital manifestations of paranasal sinus diseases]

PURPOSE

The paper is a study of the oculo-orbital affections established by the sinusal lesions.

METHODS

The study is retrospective for five years and it is affected by the patients with ocular and orbital affections hospitalized in Ophthalmological Clinic. Were used the sheets of the patients and a collaboration with ORL Clinica, where the sinusal affections were surgical cured.

RESULTS

The ocular lesions caused by the sinusal inflammations were: acute uveitis, orbital cellulitis, unilateral exophthalmia without obvious inflammatory signs. The oculo-orbital signs were missing with oculo/sinusal treatment.

CONCLUSIONS

Without treatment, the inflammatory or tumoral affections of the paranasal sinus, established oculo-orbital complications and the patients request the first time the oculist. It is necessary a collaboration between the ORL--ist and the oculist physician for of these cases.

[Adenocarcinoma of Moll's glands]

A Moll gland adenocarcinoma case is presented. The female patient was 47 years old and the affection was localized at the inferior eyelid. The histopathological exam shows the presence of intense eosinophil cells with gland-shape disposition. The histopathological exam was necessary both for the diagnosis and for the establishment of the degree of differentiation of the tumour, emphasizing the extension of infiltration localization for the neighbouring structures.

[A prevalence study of serum markers in hepatitis virus infection in the epidemiological anamnesis of the population]

Pandemic of the infections with hepatitis viruses is a priority in public health. In Romania, the very high acute and chronic morbidity by viral hepatitis demands the rapid implementation of a feasible preventive program. In the population of 5 districts from Transylvania we conducted a sero-epidemiological survey in order to find the real and specific characteristics of the prevalence of the infections with hepatitis viruses. The study was a cross-sectional study on the anamnestic presence of the infections in the population. The evolution of the cumulative prevalence of infections with HAV (74.3%) and HBV (31.7%) are proving a high endemoepidemicity. For the infections with HCV (4.9%) and HDV (1.7%) we observed an active process of endemicity. The high rate of persistent infections following HBV acute infections (19.1%) suggests a growing-up tendency of chronic hepatic diseases. In actual epidemiologic conditions, the rate of exposure to a potential hepatic viral infections in the population we studied could be 1.68 infections/person, during a period equal to life expectancy at birth.

[Postrubella secondary pigmentary retinopathy]

The paper presents the case of an 11 years-old child with secondary pigmentary retinopathy, atrial septal defect, facial dysmorphia with mandibular hypoplasia: all these malformations are part of the congenital rubeola syndrome. The patient has a twin brother presenting similar manifestations, but having a different expressivity.

[Normal and pathological conjunctival cytology]

The authors propose a cytological study of the conjunctiva, using the conjunctival print method, at patients with different (degenerative inflammatory and tumoral) ocular diseases. The conjunctival print method is less traumatic and contributes, together with the data supplied by the clinical examination, in elucidating the etiological diagnosis and orientating therapeutical conduct. Without representing a pathognomonic exam, the cytological study of the conjunctiva brings important diagnosis data, but also data concerning the evolution, so it is recommended to be done in the dynamics.

[Progressive external ophthalmoplegia and distal myopathy]

A patient, 58 years old, presents progressive blepharoptosis, in both eyes and external ophthalmoplegia. The general somatic examination, shows, at the level of the higher limbs, distal myopathy with muscular hypotony and articular deformities fibrosis and tendinous retraction. On examining the eye bottom we found colloid degeneration in the muscle region. Within the same family a ten-year-old nephew presents congenital ptosis. The muscular biopsy from the levator palpebrae shows muscular degenerative lesions with the reduction of nuclei and the proliferation of conjunctive tissue. It is shown that progressive external ophthalmoplegia must be interpreted as an ocular myopathy. The association with the distal myopathy at the level of the higher limbs, in the presented observation, upholds this pathogeny.

[Mesodermal dysgenesis of the anterior segment]

A patient is 18 years old; he presents Peters' anomaly, microcornea, the persisting of papillar membrana, congenital specifying lens for both eyes and atypical iridic coloboma for the right eye. The eye sight is diminished under the limit of practice usefulness for both eyes. The disease is thought to be a mesodermal dysgenesis of the anterior segment having some persisting fetal structures. The absence of such lesions within the same family pleads for the action of a teratogen factor that have belated action during the 4th-5th month of pregnancy.

[Brachymorphy and cataract]

A 43-years-old male patient presents pathological cataract at both eyes. The thorough somatic examination shows little size, with adiposity, short members with brachydactyly. It is discussed the presence of the pathological cataract as part of a mesodermal dysgenetic syndrome with brachymorphy and brachydactyly, different from the Weill-Marchesani syndrome.