Coronavirus and Its Impacts on Health Workers Retention: A Systematic Review and Meta-synthesis

Background: The present study aimed to determine the prerequisites and requirements forretention of human resources during the Covid-۱۹ disaster. It was tried in this study tosystematically review the challenges and prerequisites, strategies, and measures related to theretention of health workers during the disaster.Methods: This is a systematic review and meta-synthesis of all the articles related to the factors affecting the retention of human resources during the Covid-۱۹ disaster. The articles were searched using the keywords Retention, Human resource, and COVID-۱۹ in the following databases without a time limit: PubMed, Scopus, and Web of science. To select the studies, the titles, abstracts, and full texts that complied with the inclusion criteria of the present systematic review were examined, and the ۲۲۶ preliminary results and abstract were screened. Finally, ۲۳ full texts were obtained, and regarding the type and nature of the materials extracted from the studies, a meta-synthesis was used to analyze and aggregate the results of the systematic review.Results: The ۲۳ articles included in the systematic review and meta-synthesis were reviewed, and the effects of the Covid-۱۹ disaster on the healthcare staff and the retention strategies were considered as the main themes of the study. In this regard, stigma and violence against the staff, burnout and stress, increased staff workload, acquisition of communication skills, employees' mental and physical health, employee safety during disaster, staff mobilization to assist the current forces, expansion of cyberspace infrastructures, and motivational-health incentives were selected as codes.Conclusion: Retention or non-retention of the personnel during or after a disaster can be caused by the multifaceted effects of the crisis on people. Thus, a combination of several appropriate strategies should be used to respond to it in order to reduce the adverse effects of the disaster. Also, aligning the personnel can help using their synergistic power to face and respond to the challenges ahead.