Mental Health Status of Chinese Student Nurses during COVID-19: A Cross-sectional Study

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the mental health status of student nurses under COVID-19 outbreak and analyze its influencing factors.

Design: A Cross-sectional Study.

Methods: A total of 448 student nurses who had internships in various hospitals, were collected and investigated by a network questionnaire survey with symptom check list 90 (SCL-90) from March 2020. To evaluate the mental health status of student nurses though the level comparing with the national norm. To analyze the affecting factors of the mental health status of nursing students by methods of analysis of variance (ANOVA), T test and multiple linear stepwise regression analysis.

Results: During the outbreaks of COVID-19, the total score of SCL-90 of student nurses was 131.23 ± 10.34, besides, the level of total average, somatization, obsessive-compulsive, interpersonal sensitivity, depression, anxiety, phobic anxiety and psychotic of SCL-90 were significantly higher than those of national norm, it showed a statistically significant difference (P<0.05), whereas there was no significant difference in hostility and paranoid thoughts (P>0.05). The results of ANOVA showed that there were significant differences in total scores of SCL-90 among the student nurses with different education levels, perceived health status and whether they were class leaders (P<0.05). The results of multivariate analysis showed that education level, perceived health status and whether they were class leaders were the correlative factors affecting the mental health status of student nurses under COVID-19 outbreak (P<0.05).

Conclusion: During the outbreaks of COVID-19, student nurses have a certain extent of mental health problems, which may be related to the education level and perceived health status of student nurses and whether they are appointed to class leaders. Therefore, clinical nursing education should strengthen the cultivation of COVID-19-related knowledge and psychological guidance of student nurses in order to improve their mental health level.

Keywords: Novel coronavirus pneumonia, Student nurses, Mental health, Influencing factors.