Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 September 2022
In addition to physical problems, patients with COVID-19 suffer from considerable stress throughout the disease crisis and could present psychiatric consequences even after their remission.
To assess anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress symptoms among patients who had recovered from the acute COVID-19 infection in Tunisia.
A cross-sectional design included 50Tunisian adults who survived COVID-19 virus infection.Participants have been screened with a telephone interview 1 to 3 months after a diagnosis of COVID-19. We used a questionnaire including socio-psychological variables,presence of close relatives being infected, bereavement due to COVID-19 and post infection physical discomforts.The Impact of Event Scale-Revised (IES-R) was used to investigate post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Depression and anxiety were measured using The Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scales (HADS).
The age of the participants ranged from 19 to 86 years.38%were female. Twelve percent (12%) of patients required hospitalization during COVID-19 infection. After a mean of 86.60 days (SD = 23) following the diagnosis, 28 % of patients reported clinically significant PTSD. The rates of depression and anxiety disorders in our population are 20% and 30%, respectively. Seventy percent of patients (70%) reported one or more post infection physical discomforts that the most common symptoms included Difficulty breathing and anosmia. Patients with PTSD, depression or anxiety had a more frequent history of a relative diagnosed positive for corona virus, a longer duration of infection, and more frequently post-infection physical discomfort
Long-term psychological impact of COVID19 should not be ignored and mental health care could play an important role in rehabilitation.
No significant relationships.
Comments
No Comments have been published for this article.