RESEARCH ARTICLE


Relationship Between Sources of Information and the Willingness of Healthcare Workers to Risk their Lives for a Patient During the Peak of A/H1N1 Pandemic in Israel§



Yaron Bar-Dayan*, 1, 2, Sarit Natan Manor1, Noga Boldor1, 3, Inbar Kremer1, Maya Iohan Barak1, Yosefa Bar-Dayan4, 5
1 Department of Management, Bar Ilan University, Israel
2 Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben Gurion University, Israel
3 Israeli Center for Technology Assessment in Health Care, The Gertner Institute for Epidemiology and Health PolicyResearch, Tel Hashomer, Israel
4 Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, Israel
5 Interdisciplinary Department of Social Sciences, Bar Illan University, Israel

Article Information


Identifiers and Pagination:

Year: 2010
Volume: 3
First Page: 53
Last Page: 57
Publisher Id: TOEPIJ-3-53
DOI: 10.2174/1874297101003010053

Article History:

Received Date: 08/06/2010
Revision Received Date: 21/07/2010
Acceptance Date: 05/08/2010
Electronic publication date: 9/12/2010
Collection year: 2010

© 2010Bar-Dayan et al..

open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

* *Address correspondence to this author at 16 Dolev St. Or Yehuda, Israel; Tel: 00972578186215; E-mail: bardayan@netvision.net.il


Abstract

Background:

The willingness of healthcare workers to risk their lives for a patient if a fatal transformation of the virus would occur is a major concern, especially during a pandemic where the need for adequate staffing is crucial and where the public atmosphere might increase anxiety and fear of exposure.

Objective:

To examine the relationships between the source of information about the disease and the willingness of healthcare workers to risk their lives for a patient with a fatal A/H1N1 flu, during the winter A/H1N1 pandemic in Israel.

Methods:

A questionnaire was distributed to healthcare workers in 21 hospitals and 40 primary clinics in Israel between November 26, 2009 and December 10, 2009 (the peak of the winter A/H1N1 flu outbreak).

Results:

The questionnaire was completed by 1147 healthcare workers. The most common source of information reported was television (65%), followed by speaking with colleagues and reading the Ministry of Health regulations (63%) each, internet (61%), and newspapers (51%). The least common sources of information were reading a scientific article (35%) and attending a professional lecture (31%). Willingness to risk one’s life was significantly higher in healthcare workers who reported that their source of information about the disease was reading a scientific article, Ministry of Health regulations, a professional lecture, or a colleague. Willingness was not significantly different among health care workers who reported that their source of information about the disease was television programs, a newspaper article, or general internet sites.

Conclusions:

Willingness to risk one’s life for a patient is directly related to professional sources of information and is not related to nonprofessional information obtained from mass media.

Keywords: Healthcare workers, willingness, sources of information, H1N1 flu.