Nurses' Burnout in the Emergency Department and the Intensive Care Unit During COVID-19: A Literature Review

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic is a clinical threat to healthcare workers and the general population. Nurses maintain closer contact with patients than other members of the country. Therefore, nurses are at increased risk of infection, and their physical and mental burden has doubled. A comprehensive review is needed to examine nurses’ burnout during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our research follows the guidelines of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis. We conducted article searching through international databases such as PubMed and ProQuest from January to November 2020. Of the total 820 articles detected, five articles were reviewed. The results of data extraction and analysis found that the burnout feelings felt by nurses included emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and lack of personal accomplishment. We concluded that nurses experienced high levels of burnout during the COVID-19 pandemic. Keywords: burnout, COVID-19, pandemic, nurses