Mental Health Problems in Chinese Healthcare Workers Exposed to Workplace Violence During the COVID-19 Outbreak: A Cross-Sectional Study Using Propensity Score Matching Analysis

Figures & data

Table 1 Characteristics of Healthcare Workers Exposed to MWV Before PSM (N = 1063)

Variables	MWV		p value
	No (%) N=846	Yes (%) N=217
Mental health problems	25.2	38.3	0.002
Age	34.2	33.4	0.039
Social support	65.5	61.7	0.008
Category
Gender			0.019
Male	75.5%	24.5%
Female	81.6%	18.4%
Education			0.594
Junior college	75.0%	25.0%
Bachelor	80.3%	19.7%
Master or above	79.3%	20.7%
Job type			0.171
Doctor	77.8%	22.2%
Nurse	82.1%	17.9%
Other	83.1%	16.9%
Working at a designated hospital			0.036
Yes	77.3%	22.7%
No	82.6%	17.4%
Working time (hours/day)			< 0.001
≤ 8	84.9%	15.1%
> 8	74.0%	26.0%
Adequacy of preventive medical equipment			0.014
Enough or basically enough	81.8%	8.2%
Insufficient	78.9%	21.1%
Scarce	66.7%	33.3%
Discriminated against for nature of their job			< 0.001
No	82.1%	17.9%
Yes	69.2%	30.8%
Household transmission-related fears			0.023
Yes	87.7%	12.3%
No	78.6%	21.4%

Abbreviations: MWV, medical workplace violence; PSM, propensity score matching.

Table 2 Association Between MWV and Mental Health Problems: Based on OLS

Variables	Coefficient	SE
MWV (ref: No)	8.248***	1.518
Social support	−0.599***	0.054
Age	−0.038	0.085
Gender (ref: Female)	−0.387	1.360
Education (ref: Junior college)
Bachelor	0.301	2.598
Master or above	−0.092	2.778
Job type (ref: Doctor)
Nurse	−2.174	1.773
Other	1.058	1.729
Working time (ref: ≤ 8 hours/day)	5.179***	1.227
Working at a designated hospital (ref: No)	2.332^+	1.232
Household transmission-related fears (ref: No)	1.286	1.955
Discriminated against for nature of their job (ref: No)	6.665***	1.551
Adequacy of preventive medical equipment (ref: Enough or basically enough)
Insufficient	3.370**	1.280
Scarce	9.914***	2.336
Intercept	58.06***	5.970
R^2	0.231	-
N	1061	-

Note: ***p<0.001, ⁺p<0.1.

Abbreviations: MWV, medical workplace violence; OLS, ordinary least squares.

Table 3 Results of Balance Check and Sensitivity Analysis

Method	Index
1:1 Nearest neighbor matching	Pseudo R^2	0.011
	Mean of bias (%)	4.800
	LR chi2 (p value)	0.923
	N (pairs)	217
	Rosenbaum bound	1.5
1:4 Nearest neighbor matching	Pseudo R^2	0.004
	Mean of bias (%)	3.200
	LR chi2 (p value)	1.000
	N (pairs)	217
	Rosenbaum bounds	1.5
Caliper matching	Pseudo R^2	0.009
	Mean of bias (%)	4.200
	LR chi2 (p value)	0.968
	N (pairs)	217
	Rosenbaum bounds	1.6
1:4 Caliper matching	Pseudo R^2	0.005
	Mean of bias (%)	2.700
	LR chi2 (p value)	0.998
	N (pairs)	217
	Rosenbaum bound	1.5
Kernel matching	Pseudo R^2	0.001
	Mean of bias (%)	2.000
	LR chi2 (p value)	1.000
	N (pairs)	217
	Rosenbaum bound	1.5

Table 4 Results of Balance Check

	Before Matching	1:1 Nearest Neighbor Matching	1:4 Nearest Neighbor Matching	Caliper Matching	1:4 Caliper Matching	Kernel Matching
	SB (t)	SB (t)	SB (t)	SB (t)	SB (t)	SB (t)
Social support	−31.10 (−4.32***)	-9.10 (-0.95	-3.10 (-0.31)	-5.40 (-0.57)	0.10 (0.01)	-2.50 (-0.25)
Gender (ref: Female)	17.70 (2.36*)	-6.80 (-0.68)	0.90 (0.09)	-2.10 (0.20)	2.20 (0.22)	0.50 (0.05)
Age	−11.00 (−1.41)	4.40 (0.48)	−0.10 (−0.01)	1.00 (0.10)	−0.50 (−0.06)	1.70 (0.18)
Education (ref: Junior college)
Bachelor	−4.90 (−0.65)	-7.40 (-0.77)	−2.70 (−0.28)	−5.00 (−0.50)	−1.20 (−0.12)	2.40 (0.24)
Master or above	1.60 (0.21)	2.80 (0.30)	6.80 (0.71)	2. 00(0.20)	1.80(0.19)	-1.10(-0.11)
Working time (ref: ≤8 hours/day)	34.20 (4.46***)	-1.90 (0.20)	3.50(0.36)	-2.00 (0.20)	3.70 (0.37)	4.10 (0.42)
Working at a designated hospital (ref: No)	16.20 (2.10*)	6.60 (0.70)	2.60 (0.27)	8.10 (0.81)	1.20 (0.12)	1.10 (0.11)
Household transmission-related fears (ref: No)	18.80 (2.29*)	1.60 (0.19)	2.80 (0.33)	1.70(-0.19)	3.60 (0.39)	0.40 (0.04)
Discriminated against for nature of their job (ref: No)	29.70 (4.14***)	-4.40 (-0.42)	6.40 (0.62)	-2.40(-0.23)	2.90 (0.28)	2.90 (0.28)
Adequacy of preventive medical equipment (ref: Enough or basically enough)
Insufficient	3.30(0.44)	-2.90 (-0.29)	-1.60 (-0.17)	2.00 (0.20)	-0.40 (-0.04)	3.50 (0.36)
Scarce	20.80 (3.00**)	−11.1 (−0.98)	−6.80 (−0.61)	−17.00 (−0.160)	-15.2 (−1.44)	-3.30 (-0.32)
Job type (ref: Doctor)
Nurse	−8.60 (−1.11)	−2.20 (−0.24)	−3.70 (−0.39)	−4.80 (−0.49)	−2.00 (−0.20)	−1.60 (−0.17)
Other	−9.10 (−1.17)	-1.30 (-0.14)	-0.30(-0.03)	−0.30 (−0.03)	-0.30 (-0.03)	−0.90 (−0.09)

Note: ***P<0.001, *P<0.05.

Table 5 The Effect of MWV on Mental Health Problems

Treatment	Matching	Coefficient	SE	p value
MWV	1:1 Nearest neighbor matching	7.343	2.978	0.014
	1:4 Nearest neighbor matching	7.546	2.340	0.001
	Caliper matching	8.193	2.653	0.002
	1:4 Caliper matching	7.677	2.287	0.001
	Kernel matching	7.097	1.999	< 0.001

Abbreviation: MWV, medical workplace violence.