*3.4. Physical Symptoms, Perception of Health, Health-Related Variables and Psychological Distress*

76.8% claimed to have an excellent self-perceived health. A bad perception, versus an excellent health perception, is associated with a higher level of PD, with an OR = 6.803, 95% CI = (4.808, 9.524) (Table 3).


**Table 3.** Association between self-perceived health, physical symptoms, and other health variables related with psychological distress during the COVID-19 pandemic.


**Table 3.** *Cont.*

The most frequent symptoms were: headache (53.6%), rhinitis (34.8%), muscle pain (26.2%), cough (20.0%), and sore throat (19.4%). Having any of the symptoms is associated with developing PD, except for fever (1.4% had it). The symptoms with the highest percentages of high PD are: diarrhea (91.6%), dizziness (90.9%), fever (89.1%), muscle pain (89.0%), breathing difficulties (88.7%), chills (88.4%), and headache (87.5%); all results had *p* < 0.001 (Table 3).

29.3% reported having a chronic disease and 37.2% were taking medication. During the last 14 days, 8.7% had required medical care and 0.6% had required hospital care. No association was observed between these variables and developing PD.

#### *3.5. Psychological Distress and Contact History*

The proportion of participants who claimed they had not been in contact for more than 15 min and within 2 m away with an infected person was 78.1%. 71.9% reported not having been in casual contact with an infected person and 61.3% had not had any contact with a person or material suspected of being infected. 14.3% stated that they had undergone a diagnostic test (Table 4).

These contact histories, except for having received a diagnostic test, were associated with having developed PD, finding statistical significance (*p* < 0.05) and an OR greater than 1.3 (Table 4).


**Table 4.** Association between variables related with history of contact and psychological distress during the pandemic.
