Short Reports: Wellbeing Support of Healthcare Workers During COVID-19 in the Middle East

Abstract

Globally, healthcare employees are facing extraordinary stress, emotional depletion and physical exhaustion due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. This exposes employees to risk for burnout, psychological distress and disengagement at work. There is limited data examining employee wellbeing during a pandemic and equally, an absence of best practices for intervention in this time. Participation in corporate wellness programs often is sub-optimal; without incentives or penalties participation is reported to be as low as 20% of the total workforce (Mattke et al., 2020). In March 2020, cases of COVID-19 started to increase in the United Arab Emirates. In response, Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi launched “COVID-19 Well” corporate wellness program including 17 initiatives to support healthcare worker wellbeing and normalize emotional and mental health conversations. We examined participation during the ongoing pandemic; an estimated 35.75% to 48.81% of employees participated in wellbeing events. Participants attending virtual events reported significant increase (p<.05) in their emotional wellbeing post event. Moreover, the emotional wellbeing of caregivers during the pandemic documented by Mentimeter™ was similar to the emotional phases experienced during disaster commonly reported in the literature (Zunin & Myers, 2000). Healthcare worker participation in corporate health programs focused on emotional wellbeing may be well received and effective during the ongoing pandemic.