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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 · Int Arch Otorhinolaryngol 2022; 26(03): e478-e486
DOI: 10.1055/s-0042-1745854
Original Research

The Impact of COVID-19 on the Daily Life and Medical Practice of Otolaryngology Physicians

Saad Elzayat 
1   Faculty of Medicine, Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Kafrelsheikh University, Egypt
,
Haitham H. Elfarargy 
1   Faculty of Medicine, Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Kafrelsheikh University, Egypt
,
Mahmoud Mandour 
2   Faculty of Medicine, Department of Otolaryngology, Tanta University, Egypt
,
Ali Mahrous 
3   Faculty of Medicine, Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Al-Azhar University, Egypt
,
Mohamed E. El-Deeb 
1   Faculty of Medicine, Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Kafrelsheikh University, Egypt
,
Maurizio Barbara 
4   Faculty of Medicine, Department of Otolaryngology, Sapienza Roma University, Italy
,
Hossam Elsherief 
2   Faculty of Medicine, Department of Otolaryngology, Tanta University, Egypt
› Author Affiliations Funding The authors have no funding or financial relationships to disclose.
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Abstract

Introduction The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has made otolaryngologists more susceptible than their counterparts to its effect.

Objective This study aimed to find if COVID-19 had a different impact on ear, nose, and throat (ENT) physicians' of various categories (residents, registrars, and consultants ) regarding many aspects of the quality of life (protection, training, financial, and psychological aspects).

Methods We included 375 ENT physicians, of different categories (residents, registrars, and consultants), from 33 general hospitals and 26 university hospitals in Egypt. The study was conducted using a 20-item questionnaire with a response scale consisting of three categories: yes, no, and not sure. It covered infection control and personal protective equipment (PPE) usage; medical practice and safety; online consultation and telemedicine,; webinars and online lectures; COVID-19 psychological, financial, and quarantine period effects; and future expectations.

Results The results of the questionnaire showed that COVID-19 had a statistically significant impact on the daily life of the responders. There were statistically significant differences among the three involved categories, based on their answers.

Conclusion This study showed a statistically significant difference regarding the impact of COVID-19 on many aspects of the quality of life (protection, training, financial, and psychological aspects) of ENT physicians of various categories (residents, registrars, and consultants), and these effects may persist for a long time.

Keywords

COVID-19 - quality of life - impact - otolaryngology

Consent to participate

Explanation and informed written consent for this research has been taken from all patients.


Consent for publication

Formal consent was signed by the patients to share and to publish their data in this research.


Availability of data and materials

The data sets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.


Authors' Contributions

S. Z.: methodology; H. H.: idea formulation and data collection; M. M.: review writing and revision; A. M: reference collection and final revision; M. E.: formal analysis; M. B.: idea formulation and editing final draft; and H. E.: drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content


Ethical approval

All procedures performed in this study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional research editorial boards and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.




Publication History

Received: 16 February 2022

Accepted: 01 March 2022

Article published online:
14 July 2022

© 2022. Fundação Otorrinolaringologia. This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commecial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

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