Distress Tolerance and Factors Affecting It among Nurses Working in the COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit

Mehdi Dehghani  Firoozabadi; Sajjad  Mirzaee; Afzal  Shamsi

doi:10.18502/aacc.v11i3.18500

Mehdi Dehghani Firoozabadi Department of Anesthesiology, School of Medicine, Tehran Heart Center, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Iran.
Sajjad Mirzaee Department of Anesthesia, School of Allied Medical Sciences, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
Afzal Shamsi Department of Anesthesia, School of Allied Medical Sciences, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.18502/aacc.v11i3.18500

Keywords: Nurse; Covid-19; Distress tolerance; Intensive care unit

Abstract

Background: Nurses, as professionals in the caring profession, try to perform safe and effective nursing interventions all the time and support patients to achieve the most favorable treatment outcomes. Nowadays, one of the important and international issues in nursing is distress tolerance. This study aimed to determine distress tolerance and affecting it among nurses working in the COVID-19 intensive care unit.

Methods: This study is cross-sectional. The sample consisted of 128 nurses working in the intensive care unit. A non-randomized convenience sampling method was used to select the samples based on the inclusion criteria. The data collection instruments included two questionnaires: a demographic characteristics questionnaire and a standardized distress tolerance questionnaire. The data were analyzed using SPSS software version 25, employing both descriptive and inferential statistical tests.

Results: The mean age of the samples was 34.95 ± 6.77 years. The highest scores of distress tolerance subscales included appraisal (17.89±3.62), tolerance (8.97±2.60), absorption (8.83±2.30), and regulation (2.25 ±8.39), respectively. The statistical test of linear regression showed that service history and shift work have a significant power to predict nurses' distress tolerance.

Conclusion: The distress tolerance of nurses working in the ICU units was low. Factors such as service history and shift work influence their distress tolerance. Accordingly, it is necessary to plan to improve nurses' distress tolerance.