key: cord-0718530-sj09u7ca
authors: Taira, K.; Hosokawa, R.; Shiomi, M.
title: Changes in the number of public health nurses employed in local governments in Japan during the Covid-19 pandemic: A cross-sectional study
date: 2022-02-08
journal: nan
DOI: 10.1101/2022.02.06.22270346
sha: 1987ca682f9e82a9fc02bfbf36c49b27b1f33bf9
doc_id: 718530
cord_uid: sj09u7ca

Objectives: This study aims to clarify the recruitment of public health nurses in local governments in Japan during the Covid-19 pandemic. Study design: A cross-sectional study. Methods: A cross-sectional study of 150 local governments that have public health centers in Japan was conducted. The survey period was November to December 2021. The survey items were the number of full-time and part-time public health nurses (PHNs), the number of PHNs who resigned or retired from the job, and the number of PHN recruitment examinations for each year from 2017 to 2021. For all variables, the mean, standard deviation, maximum, and minimum values for each type of municipality and year were calculated, and a one-way analysis of variance was performed. Results: The recovery rate was 54.0% (81/150). Although a statistically significant difference was not recorded in the change in employment status of PHNs from 2019 to 2020, during the year that COVID-19 infection began in Japan, the number of full-time PHNs increased by only 2.6 at the maximum, while the number of part-time PHNs was 5.2 {+/-}8.3 to 10.8{+/-}9.6 (p = 0.61) for prefectures, from 13.6{+/-}13.1 to 21.5{+/-}34.8 (p = 0.23) for city, and from 16.8{+/-}26.8 to 52.3{+/-}132.5 (p = 0.70) for ward. Conclusions: This study reveals that support for the increased workload due to COVID-19 is heavily dependent on part-time PHNs. Drastic change to the ideal way of the original countermeasure to Covid-19 in Japan or the supply of stronger human support to the public health center might be desired

Since January 2020, a series of nationwide outbreaks of Covid-19 has occurred in Japan. 1 In Japan, public health nurses working in public health centers owned by local governments were responsible for active epidemiological research, coordination of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing, the control of admission to and discharge from hospitals, and the health management of patients recuperating at home. 2, 3 The workload increased with the number of patients, but the changes in the number of public health nurses was not researched. This study aims to examine the recruitment of public health nurses in local governments in Japan during the Covid-19 pandemic.

A cross-sectional study was conducted of 150 local governments that have public health centers in Japan: 47 prefectures, 80 cities, and 23 special wards of Tokyo. The survey was carried out from November to December 2021, and it was executed by mail to the human resources department of each local government. The subjects were the number of full-time and part-time PHNs, the number of PHNs who resigned or retired from the job, and the number of PHN recruitment examinations for each year from 2017 to 2021. For all variables, the mean, standard deviation, maximum, and minimum values for each type of municipality and year were calculated, and a one-way analysis of variance was performed.

The recovery rate was 54.0% (81/150). Focusing on the results from 2020, when the COVID-19 outbreak began, is the author/funder, who has granted medRxiv a license to display the preprint in (which was not certified by peer review) preprint 5 and public health centers are on the verge of dysfunction. Although observation of Omicron has shown lower rates of disease severity and mortality, 6,7 a drastic change to the original countermeasures to Covid-19 in Japan or the supply of stronger human support to public health centers might be desired.

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Structure and roles of public health centers (hokenjo) in Japan

Japanese strategy to COVID-19: How does it work? Glob Health Med

Preventing the dysfunction of public health centres responding to COVID-19 by focusing on public health nurses in Japan

News-classification of omicron(B1.1.529): SARS-CoV-2 variant of concern

Trends in disease severity and health care utilization during the early omicron variant period compared with previous SARS-CoV-2 high transmission periods-United States

Severity of Omicron variant of concern and vaccine effectiveness against symptomatic disease: National cohort with nested test negative design study in Scotland

Ethics committee of the Kyoto University Graduate School and Faculty of Medicine, Kyoto University Hospital waived ethical approval for this work. This study was funded by the research support fund "Kusunoki 125" by the university to which the author belongs.

It is made available under a perpetuity.is the author/funder, who has granted medRxiv a license to display the preprint in (which was not certified by peer review) preprint . CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license It is made available under a perpetuity.

is the author/funder, who has granted medRxiv a license to display the preprint in (which was not certified by peer review) preprintThe copyright holder for this this version posted February 8, 2022. ; https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.02.06.22270346 doi: medRxiv preprint