The Role of Resilience and Emotion Regulation in Psychological Distress of Hospital Staff During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Systematic Review Study

Background: During the COVID-2019 pandemic, the hospital staff was among the first to deal with this problem. Because of the high workload, the medical staff may experience psychological distress. In this regard, the present study was conducted to investigate the role of resilience and emotion regulation in managing the psychological distress of hospital staff during the COVID-2019 pandemic. Methods: In the present study, we searched English databases, such as Google Scholar, PubMed, Scopus, ScienceDirect, and Iranian databases, such as Iranian databases of Scientific Information Database (SID), Iranian Publications (Magiran), and Iranian Medical Sciences Articles from February 2020 to July 2021 with using the keywords of “coronavirus 2019”, “COVID-19”, “depression”, “anxiety”, “stress”, “resilience”, “emotion regulation”, “mental health”, “medical staff”, and “psychological distress”. We also used the PRISMA (The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis) checklist to review and control the quality of the articles. Results: Studies have shown that resilience and emotion regulation strategies positively affect nurses, physicians, hospital staff, and medical students during the COVID-19 pandemic. Good resilience and using adaptive emotion regulation strategies have reduced their anxiety, depression, insomnia, and fear, which results in increased psychological well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic. Conclusion: Based on the reviewed articles, we found that COVID-19 can affect various aspects of the mental health of hospital staff. Given that COVID-19 is still mutating and it is impossible to predict a specific time for the end of this deadly virus, medical staff must receive the necessary training to improve resilience and emotion regulation strategies.