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. 2023 Jul 10;18(7):e0281321.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0281321. eCollection 2023.

Impact of the covid-19 pandemic on mental health and sexuality of female doctors

Nadine de Souza Ziegler  1   2 , Gabriel Cardozo Muller  3 , Fernanda Santos Grossi  1   2 , Rodolfo de Carvalho Pacagnella  4 , Julia Schneider Hermel  5 , Janete Vettorazzi  1   2   5   6
Affiliations

Impact of the covid-19 pandemic on mental health and sexuality of female doctors

Nadine de Souza Ziegler et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Background: COVID-19 pandemic has changed people's lives around the world due to restrictive measures adopted by governments. The impact of this change on female sexuality needs to be further investigated, particularly between female doctors who are more at risk as they are directly involved with health care services.

Methods: An online survey has been filled out by female doctors. The questionnaire evaluates sexual function, depression, anxiety, burnout, sociodemographic and professional data, and it was answered during the peak of COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil. The main outcome is female doctors' sexual function during COVID-19 pandemic, which was evaluated by analyzing FSFI questionnaires. The secondary outcome is related to their mental health, assessed via depression, anxiety and burnout questionnaires.

Results: A sample of 388 female doctors filled out the questionnaire. The median age was 34.0 (29.0, 43.0) years old. The total FSFI median score was 23.8 [18.9, 26.8] with desire domain median of 5.0 [3.0, 7.0]. In our sample, 231 (59.5%) women had depression and/or anxiety, out of these, 191 (82.7%) had depression and 192 (83.2%), anxiety. From these samples of doctors with depression and/or anxiety, 183 (79.2%) had sexual dysfunction.

Conclusion: This finding suggests that doctors are experiencing a high risk of sexual dysfunction and mental illness during the COVID-19 outbreak. A high index of depression and/or anxiety was shown in the studied population, with almost 80% of them reaching criteria for sexual dysfunction. Working in the frontline is related to worse mental health conditions. Depression and anxiety were found as potential mediators of burnout effect on sexual function.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1. Heatmap of questionnaires.
Horizontal and vertical labels represent each questionnaire score. Correlation coefficients are expressed by colors according to its color scale, represented from blue to red, meaning negative/inverse to positive/direct correlations. Statically significant correlations (p<0.05) are displayed with an asterisk on its square. Each letter represents one dominium/score: A—FSFI desire dominium, B—FSFI arousal dominium, C—FSFI lubrication dominium, D—FSFI orgasm dominium, E—GAD-7 total score, F—PHQ-9 total score, G—Burnout Maslach Emotional Exhaustion, H—Burnout Maslach Depersonalization, I—Burnout Maslach Personal Realization.
Fig 2
Fig 2. Structural equation model framework.
Summarized Plot of SEM Model, variables (anxiety, depression, sexual dysfunction, burnout) are displayed in circles, since they are latent variables, composed by its scores. Green arrows represent positive coefficients and red arrows represent negative coefficients, thickness of arrows is proportional and opacity inversely proportional to relation strength. To improve visualization, scores and covariations were hidden.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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