COVID-19 pandemic effects on the mental health of an academic community

Abstract

Objective: To identify COVID-19 pandemic effects on mental health in an academic community from a federal university. Methods: Transversal study carried out with 586 individuals from the academic community from the Universidade Federal de Ciências da Saúde de Porto Alegre. We elaborated an online multiple-choice questionnaire hosted in the RedCap platform. We elaborated the questionnaire based on a guide content, which addresses the main considerations of mental health during the pandemic. Aspects of mental health, such as anguish, irritability, among others, were the outcome evaluated. We carried out the statistical analysis in the Statistical Package for Social Sciences software and the association between variables was evaluated through the Chi-square test and the student T-test. The signifi cance level adopted was 5%. Results: 586 individuals participated: 81% women, 72,8% Exploratory, transversal, and quantitative study, where the scenario was the Universidade Federal de Ciência da Saúde de Porto Alegre (UFCSPA), located in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. The transversal study is characterized by the direct observation of a sample of individuals in a single moment, 58,2% with per capita income of minimum 5 salaries, and 90,3% white. The most prevalent feelings were: Impotence (93,5%), anguish (90,8%), fear of losing relatives, friends or familiars (90,1%), irritability (85,3%) and sadness (89,9%). We found that female sex is a factor of risk to present most of the feelings, except irritability and boredom. Conclusion: The COVID-19 pandemic affected the mental health of the academic community, reinforcing the necessity of establishing psychological intervention protocols in the pandemic. We found a signifi cant statistical difference between the sexes, in which the psychological effects are more severe in the female sex.