Occupational Health for Healthcare Workers: State of the Art and Perspectives Arising from the COVID-19 Syndemic

Dear Colleagues,

Healthcare workers (HCWs) are an occupational category exposed to a large variety of professional risks. In this view, occupational infections, unsafe patient handling, chemical exposures and psychosocial risks—including violence and aggression—represent the most common threats for HCWs’ health. Despite several efforts to improve prevention strategies during the last several decades, continuing to face both traditional and emerging occupational health issues is of fundamental importance towards the goal of healthier and safer healthcare workplaces.

The recent COVID-19 syndemic shed light on a new paradigm where emerging risk factors synergistically concur alongside traditional ones, leading to adverse health outcomes. Therefore, a tailored approach is needed to protect HCWs’ health both at the individual level and in specific vulnerable sub-groups.

Innovative approaches developed to face the challenges posed by the pandemic period could be useful to re-assess and confront occupational health risks, providing new opportunities for health protection in this working population. High-quality scientific evidence is needed for assessing the appropriateness of strategies and interventions, and for promoting their advancement and implementation.

We aim to gather high-quality original research about innovative approaches and perspectives applied in the practice of occupational health for HCWs. This will provide an evidence-based platform that will be extremely useful for the prevention and protection of this essential working category.

Dr. Guglielmo Dini
Prof. Dr. Paolo Durando
Guest Editors

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• COVID-19 syndemic
• pandemic
• healthcare workers
• occupational medicine
• preventive and protective strategies
• emerging innovative technology applied to occupational medicine
• risk factors