Psychological impact of COVID-19 on radiology: Emotional wellbeing versus psychological burnout

While the COVID-19 pandemics seem to be crippling the global health care system, it has caused enormous uncertainty and panic in the lives of the health care professionals with a significant impact on their productivity. A significant proportion of these affected health care individuals comprise of the working staff belonging to the Radiology department. Although the main focus of all health care individuals has constantly been to reduce the number of new cases by minimal transmission, save lives of the infected patients by findings effective cure and carry out meticulous research to develop preventive vaccine, we have been unknowingly giving very little consideration to critical issues relating to the psychological well-being of the front liners. It is of utmost necessity that the psychological impact of this pandemic needs to be recognized and dealt with, in a timely fashion. While planning interventions to fight the pandemic, mental health issues must not be sidelined instead considered pragmatically. The radiology departments must come up with a mitigation plan to combat the subsequent short-term and long-term adverse effects of COVID-19 on mental well-being of their staff members. This article discusses the psychological impact of COVID-19 on the radiology department.