COVID-19 AND COLLECTIVE TRAUMA: A QUALITATIVE DESCRIPTIVE STUDY EXPLORING THE EXPERIENCE OF A PANDEMIC FROM A NURSING PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic can be described as a collective trauma – a shared traumatic experience that will continue to impact physical, mental and psychosocial health for years to come. For nurses, the impact was compounded by existing workplace concerns including burnout, traumatic stress, and unhealthy work environments that also contribute to poor patient outcomes. While there is broad recognition of the importance of nurse well-being to public health, prior research emphasized individual-level causes and interventions that have had limited impact. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to explore the experience of nurses in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic to develop knowledge of the structural and social factors that influence nurse well-being. This qualitative descriptive study employed collective trauma as a sensitizing framework and was conducted in two phases. Phase I results indicated that two years into the pandemic, disrupted connections between nurses and their peers, patients, and the community challenged participants’ sense of meaning and purpose. Phase II data, collected two years later, extended these findings by illustrating how the pandemic’s long-term impact on collective identity and social capital intersects with systemic deficiencies in the work environment to influence nurse well-being.