Abstract:

Introduction: The workload of healthcare professionals has increased remarkably during the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the personal life-threatening risk, all occupational groups in the healthcare sector have fulfilled their duties with undoubted devotion. Since the beginning of the pandemic, metaphors such as “wave”, “tsunami”, “fight against the pandemic” and “war” have often been used in the media to describe the struggle against the disease, and metaphors such as “heroes at the forefront in the fight against the pandemic” have widely been used for healthcare professionals. It is important to investigate how these healthcare professionals in the COVID-19 frontline are affected by this process. Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate healthcare professionals’ perceptions regarding COVID-19. Methods: The study had a phenomenological design, an accepted qualitative research method. Healthcare professionals’ perceptions of COVID-19 were examined through metaphor analysis. The study was carried out with the participation of 147 healthcare professionals. To determine their perceptions of COVID-19, they were asked to complete the sentence “I think COVID-19 (Coronavirus) is like .................. because ..................”. The data were analyzed through the content analysis method. Results: A total of 52 metaphors were produced by the participants and these were evaluated under 10 categories: awareness; lifestyle changes; warning to humanity; uncertainty/uncontrollability; anxiety/worry; restriction/limitation; medical reality; longing; death/loss; and questioning his/her professional value. In addition to the healthcare professionals who saw COVID-19 as "uncertainty", "limitation", and "worry-anxiety", it is noteworthy that most of them also described COVID-19 as "awareness" and reported that it led to a change in their lifestyle. In the study, it was observed that negative attributions associated with COVID-19 were generally more common, but it was also reported to promote positive awareness of life. Conclusions: It is hoped that these findings can provide an impetus for implementing new regulations to improve the conditions of healthcare professionals.

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