{"doi":"10.1017/gmh.2022.30","title":"Anxiety and depressive symptoms among physicians during the COVID-19 pandemic in Bangladesh: a cross-sectional study","abstract":"Objectives: In addition to risking their physical well-being, frontline physicians are enduring significant emotional burden both at work and home during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. This study aims to investigate the levels of anxiety and depressive symptoms and to identify associated factors among Bangladeshi physicians during the COVID-19 outbreak. Methods and design: A cross-sectional study using an online survey following a convenience sampling technique was conducted between April 21 and May 10, 2020. Outcomes assessed included demographic questions, COVID-19 related questions, and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS). Results: The survey was completed by 412 Bangladeshi physicians. The findings revealed that, in terms of standardized HADS cut-off points, the prevalence of anxiety and depressive symptoms among physicians was 67.72% and 48.5% respectively. Risk factors for higher rates of anxiety or depressive symptoms were: being female, physicians who had experienced COVID-19 like symptoms during the pandemic, those who had not received incentives, those who used self-funded personal protective equipment (PPE), not received adequate training, lacking perceived self-efficacy to manage COVID-19 positive patients, greater perceived stress of being infected, fear of getting assaulted/humiliated, being more connected with social media, having lower income levels to support the family, feeling more agitated, less than 2 h of leisure activity per day and short sleep duration. All these factors were found to be positively associated with anxiety and depression in unadjusted and adjusted statistical models. Conclusions: This study identifies a real concern about the prevalence of anxiety and depressive symptoms among Bangladeshi physicians and identifies several associated factors during the COVID-19 pandemic. Given the vulnerability of the physicians in this extraordinary period whilst they are putting their own lives at risk to help people infected by COVID-19, health authorities should address the psychological needs of medical staff and formulate effective strategies to support vital frontline health workers.","journal":"Cambridge Prisms Global Mental Health","year":2022,"id":246524,"datarank":0.5495342469194471,"base_score":3.6635616461296463,"endowment":3.6635616461296463,"self_citation_contribution":0.5495342469194471,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.5495342469194471,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":38,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9239,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":553638,"name":"Sahadat Hossain","orcid":"0000-0001-9433-202X","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553639,"name":"Farhana Safa","orcid":"0000-0003-0709-580X","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553640,"name":"Afifa Anjum","orcid":"0000-0002-0784-4332","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553641,"name":"Abid Hasan Khan","orcid":"0000-0002-1761-4813","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553642,"name":"Kamrun Nahar Koly","orcid":"0000-0003-2466-8139","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":554859,"name":"Syeda Fatema Alam","orcid":null,"position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553643,"name":"Md. Abdur Rafi","orcid":"0000-0002-5415-6399","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":42388,"name":"Vivek Podder","orcid":"0000-0003-3103-3043","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":554860,"name":"Tonima Islam Trisa","orcid":null,"position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":554861,"name":"Rhedeya Nury Nodi","orcid":null,"position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":554862,"name":"Dewan Tasnia Azad","orcid":null,"position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553644,"name":"Fatema Ashraf","orcid":"0000-0002-9352-1192","position":12,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":554863,"name":"S. M. Quamrul Akther","orcid":null,"position":13,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553645,"name":"Helal Uddin Ahmed","orcid":"0000-0003-0463-1822","position":14,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553646,"name":"Simon Rosenbaum","orcid":"0000-0002-8984-4941","position":15,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":232314,"name":"Graham Thornicroft","orcid":"0000-0003-0662-0879","position":16,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":553637,"name":"M. Tasdik Hasan","orcid":"0000-0002-3256-093X","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":41,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-19T00:23:48.622830Z","pmid":"36606239","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}