COVID-19 Related Fears of Patients Admitted to a Psychiatric Emergency Department during and Post-Lockdown in Switzerland: Preliminary Findings to Look Ahead for Tailored Preventive Mental Health Strategies

• Published in: Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) Lithuania), 2021-12, Vol.57 (12), p.1360
• Main Authors: Costanza, Alessandra, Macheret, Laura, Folliet, Aline, Amerio, Andrea, Aguglia, Andrea, Serafini, Gianluca, Prada, Paco, Bondolfi, Guido, Sarasin, François, Ambrosetti, Julia
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Age; Aged; Anxiety; Communicable Disease Control; containment measures; Coronaviruses; COVID-19; Data analysis; Disease; Emergency Service, Hospital; Epidemics; Fear; Fear & phobias; fears; Grief; Humans; Infections; isolation; lockdown; Mental depression; Mental disorders; Mental Health; Mental health care; Pandemics; Patients; Population; post-lockdown; Public health; Retrospective Studies; SARS-CoV-2; Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2; Stress; Switzerland
• ISSN: 1648-9144; 1010-660X; 1648-9144
• DOI: 10.3390/medicina57121360

: While the impact on mental health of 2019 coronavirus (COVID-19) has been extensively documented, little is known about its influence on subjective fears. Here, we investigate the COVID-19 impact and its related restrictions on fears of patients admitted to a psychiatric Emergency Department (ED) during and post-lockdown. : A retrospective study on 1477 consultations at the psychiatric ED of the University Hospital of Geneva (HUG) was performed using a mixed-methods analysis. The first analysis section was qualitative, aiming to explore the type of fears, while the second section statistically compared fears (i) during lockdown (16 March 2020-10 May 2020) and (ii) post-lockdown (11 May 2020-5 July 2020). Fears were also explored among different patient-age sub-groups. : 334 patients expressed one/more fears. Both in lockdown and post-lockdown, fears mostly pertained to "containment measures" (isolation, loneliness). When compared lockdown vs. post-lockdown, fears about "work status" (deteriorating, losing work) prevailed in lockdown ( = 0.029) while "hopelessness" (powerless feeling, inability to find solutions) in post-lockdown ( = 0.001). "Self around COVID-19" (dying, getting sick) fear was relatively more frequent in youth ( = 0.039), while "hopelessness" in the elderly ( < 0.001). : Collectively, these findings highlight that lockdown/post-lockdown periods generated temporally and demographically distinct COVID-19 related fears patterns, with special regard to youth and elderly, two particularly vulnerable populations when faced with sudden and unexpected dramatic events. For this reason, the particular ED "front-line service" status makes it a privileged observatory that can provide novel insights. From a mental health perspective, these latter can be translated into pragmatic, more personalized prevention strategies to reinforce specific resilience resources and mitigate the current and long-term pandemic's impact.