The Causal Model of Coronavirus Anxiety in the Medical Staff Based on Coping Styles

Introduction: The outbreak of Covid-19 has posed a great threat to the health and psychological states of the medical staff. This study aimed to develop a causal model of coronavirus anxiety in the medical staff based on coping styles. Method: This cross-sectional research was descriptive, of structural equations type. It was conducted from May 2020 to June 2020 with the participation of 100 medical staff in the COVID- 19 Intensive Care Unit (ICU) in Imam Reza Hospital in Mashhad during the COVID-19 pandemic selected by the census method. They answered Alipour et al.’s coronavirus anxiety and Calsbeek et al.’s coping styles online questionnaires. Research data were analyzed by SPSS (24.0) and LISREL version 8.8. Results: According to the demographic data, 42% of participants were male and 48% were female. The results of this study indicated that the coronavirus anxiety model based on coping styles has a good fit (GFI=0.91). According to the obtained results, the causal model confirmed the relationship between coping styles and coronavirus anxiety in the medical staff based on different fitness indices (P lt;0.00). Conclusion: The findings of the present study showed that problem-focused coping style has a negative relationship with coronavirus anxiety and emotion- focused coping style has positive relationship with coronavirus anxiety. Understanding the protective and high-risk coping strategies used by health care workers during pandemics is fundamental to maintain mental health among frontline workers during chronic stress such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on the findings of the present study, it is suggested that behavioral interventions should be performed to reduce the use of emotion-focused coping styles that can increase the anxiety of medical staff.