The Psychosocial Impact of Treating Patients with COVID-19 on Psychiatry Residents in a Community Hospital: a Qualitative Study

OBJECTIVE: The authors explored the experiences of psychiatry residents caring for patients during the COVID-19 pandemic on a medical unit. METHODS: From June 2020 through December 2020, structured, individual interviews were conducted with psychiatry residents deployed to internal medicine wards in a community hospital to provide medical care to COVID-19 patients for greater than or equal to 1 week. Interviews were recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using thematic analytical methods. RESULTS: Psychiatry residents (n = 16) were interviewed individually for approximately 45 min each. During the interviews, many residents described emotions of fear, anxiety, uncertainty, lack of preparedness, and difficulty coping with high patient mortality rates. Many of the residents expressed concerns regarding insufficient personal protective equipment, with the subsequent worries of their own viral exposure and transmission to loved ones. Multiple residents expressed feeling ill-equipped to care for COVID-19 patients, in some cases stating that utilizing their expertise in mental health would have better addressed the mental health needs of colleagues and patients’ families. Participants also described the benefits of processing emotions during supportive group sessions with their program director. CONCLUSIONS: The COVID-19 pandemic represents a public health crisis with potential negative impacts on patient care, professionalism, and physicians’ well-being and safety. The psychiatry residents and fellows described the overwhelmingly negative impact on their training. The knowledge gained from this study will help establish the role of the psychiatrist not only in future crises but in healthcare as a whole.