Clinicians’ Social Support, Job Stress, and Intent to Leave Healthcare during COVID-19

The onset of COVID-19 has escalated healthcare workers’ psychological distress. Multiple factors, including prolonged exposure to COVID-19 patients, irregular working hours, and workload, have substantially contributed to stress and burnout among healthcare workers. To explore the impact of COVID-19 on healthcare workers, our study compares the job stress, social support, and intention to leave the job among healthcare workers working in a pandemic (H(P)) and a non-pandemic hospital (H(NP)) in Turkey during the pandemic. The cross-sectional, paper-based survey involved 403 healthcare workers including physicians, registered nurses, health technicians, and auxiliary staff across two hospitals from 1 September 2020 to 31 November 2020. The findings indicate a significant impact of ‘Job stress’ on ‘Intent to leave’ job among participants in the H(P). We noted that ‘intent to leave’ and ‘job stress’ were significantly higher among the H(P) healthcare workers than those working in the H(NP,) respectively. However, workers’ ‘social support’ was significantly lower in the H(P). Healthcare workers, during COVID-19, face several hurdles such as job stress, reduced social support, and excessive workload, all of which are potential factors influencing a care provider’s intent to leave the job.