Emerging Evidence on Workplace Interventions and Strategies to Support and Facilitate the Wellbeing of Frontline Healthcare Workers During Health Crisis Events: A Rapid Scoping Review Protocol

<b>Abstract:</b><b>Objective: </b>The objective of this rapid review is to identify and map the state of emerging evidence and lessons learnt on interventions and strategies to support and facilitate the well-being of frontline healthcare workers during health emergencies, with a specific focus on evidence which has emerged since 2020, including evidence related to interventions during the covid-19 pandemic and mpox outbreaks.<b>Introduction:</b> Frontline healthcare professionals may be at an elevated risk of experiencing negative impacts upon their wellbeing and resilience associated with their workplace environments when responding to health crisis events. There is potential scope for organisational interventions within the workplace to contribute to increasing or maintaining staff wellbeing and/or reducing harms to frontline staff responding to health crisis events. However, the strength of evidence-base to support evidence-informed interventions in this area has historically been poor; as concluded by a 2020 Cochrane Review (Pollock et al. 2020) on this subject. However, since that review was conducted, significant attention to the mental health of healthcare workers and the emergence of multiple public health emergencies of international concern are likely to have led to the emergence of new insights into interventions with impacts upon frontline healthcare workers’ psychosocial experiences and system resilience. Consequently, this review will seek to understand the state of emerging evidence in this area; focusing on evidence emerging from interventions related to public health emergencies of international concern and outbreak responses to WHO R&amp;D Blueprint pathogens with pandemic or epidemic potential, with a focus on reports of interventions published in 2020 or later.<b>Inclusion criteria: </b>This rapid review focuses on interventions and strategies with impacts upon the wellbeing and psychosocial resilience of frontline healthcare workers responding to public health emergencies of international concern and outbreaks of priority pathogens with pandemic or epidemic potential. Frontline healthcare workers working in primary, secondary, tertiary or community health settings are included where these workers perform ‘body work’ in the course of their duties.<b>Methods:</b> The methods utilised in this rapid review have been adapted Joanna Briggs Institute guidance for scoping reviews. We will search CENTRAL, MEDLINE (PubMed); EMBASE; PsychINFO; and CINAHL (EBSCO). Results will be screened in Covidence and data will be analysed in Microsoft Excel. Articles for inclusion will be limited to those published in English or French.<b>Keywords: </b>Frontline healthcare worker; workplace interventions; workforce resilience; infectious disease outbreaks; health emergencies