Previously submitted to: Interactive Journal of Medical Research (no longer under consideration since Jan 19, 2023)
Date Submitted: Oct 31, 2021
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Mobile apps for health professionals experiencing stress and burnout: scoping review
ABSTRACT
Background:
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the mental health crisis within the health workforce. There is evidence that mobile apps that promote psychosocial wellness may be an effective, low-cost, and widely accessible tool to reduce stress and burnout among HCPs.
Objective:
The objective of this scoping review is to explore whether there are mobile-based apps tailored to HCPs for stress and burnout relief during a crisis time and explore their characteristics and key features.
Methods:
The Google Play and Apple app stores were searched for wellness apps using the key words “relaxation” and “mental wellness”. The first 100 search results were assessed for eligibility. This was supplemented by an online search for burnout and stress relief apps for physicians and/or nurses. The apps were included if they focused on burnout and/or stress relief and demonstrated relevance to HCPs. More specifically, the app must be marketed to HCPs, recommended by health professional organizations, or was studied for efficacy among HCPs. The details of included apps were extracted on Microsoft Excel.
Results:
Most burnout and/or stress relief apps are targeted to the general population. Few apps (n=8) were specifically built for HCPs, but the pandemic crisis has encouraged existing apps to create specific content for this group (n=7). The features within apps relevant to HCPs were largely mindfulness/meditation (n=19) and wellness education (n=12), whereas community support (n=9) and access to psychological services (n=4) were less common.
Conclusions:
Stress and burnout are widespread and severe among HCPs during the COVID-19 crisis. Mobile apps may be a feasible tool to offer wellness interventions, but most existing apps do not provide targeted content for HCPs. For those that do, they largely focus on individual-based activities, rather than external support.
Citation
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Copyright
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