Work Efficiency, Physical and Neurological Dysfunction Associated with the Number of Personal Protective Equipment-Donned by Doctors Working Hours in a Covid Care Center at Puducherry

Abstract

Background:Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) forms a very important part of the protective armour for the frontline warriors in this battle against the COVID-19 pandemic. Present study aimed to assess thework efficiency, physical and neurological dysfunction associated with the number of Personal Protective Equipment-donned working hours by Doctors in a Covid care center.

Material & Method: This cross-sectional study was conducted among the doctors working in COVID ward of AVMCH during the June 2021 to November 2021. All the doctors worked in COVID-19 ward and willing to be part of study were included. Doctors with presence of co-morbidities like diabetes, hypertension, asthma, obesity, infected with COVID-19 and not willing were excluded. Ethical clearance for the study was obtained from the institution prior to initiation of study and consent was taken from all the participants. An online validated questionnaire was shared to participants through Google form and were requested to fill the form. The collected response were analysed using STATA v7 for statistical analysis.

Result: Total of 220 participants included in the study, with mean age of 26.75±2.69yrs. among them 87 were female participant and 133 were male participants. On assessment of questionnaire agreed for respective questions as difficulty in decision making (74.6%), difficulty in communication (93.1%), missing simple prescriptions (83.6%), urge to doff (66.4%), headache (78.1%), difficulty in writing (69.1%), and difficulty in seeing (70%).

Conclusion: In present study we documented higher incidence of the physical dysfunction and neurological dysfunction among the doctors worked in COVID-19 care associated with use of PPE.