Evaluating Satisfaction with performance of health-care volunteers during COVID-19 Pandemic in Tehran hospitals

Despite the successful eradication of many infectious diseases around the world, the human population has been affected by new diseases. New COVID-19 has inflicted irreparable damage on humanity. Many health workers and volunteers came together to act effectively against the disease. The current study was conducted to evaluate the satisfaction with the performance of volunteers in perspectives of themselves and other health-workers.

A total 750 health workers (250 nurses and 500 volunteers) enrolled in our study via convenience sampling. Sample size was calculated with Cochran's method. Inclusion criteria were working in COVID-19 wards as a nurse/volunteer in 6 Tehran hospitals, and willing to participate in the study. A research made questionnaire was used to after assuring validity. Data was gathered from19 February to 19 April 2020.

While a total of 92% of nurses rated the performance of volunteers as very good, 95% of the volunteers self-assessed their performance as good as possible. The nurses of some hospitals were more satisfied with the volunteers' performance than the other study setting. Different factors such as the degree of observance of hygienic principles, the level of discipline of health care volunteers, how to deal with patients, coordinating their work with the activities of ward nurses influenced the nurses' perspectives toward the volunteers' performance.

Considering the high level of satisfaction with performance of volunteers from the perspectives of themselves and nurses, our study findings indicated the positive effects of volunteers’ presence during pandemics