From ethical confrontation to suffering: what did the Covid-19 pandemic teach us about the work process in oral health

This multicentric qualitative study aimed to understand how difficulties in the work process were perceived and felt by oral health workers (including dentists, technicians, and assistants) in ethical and mental health terms during the Covid-19 pandemic. A discursive textual analysis was conducted analyzing responses from 2560 workers to three open-ended questions in a websurvey from August to October 2020 in the Brazilian Southern region. The main difficulties in the work process included understanding the interruption of elective appointments and prioritizing emergencies, accessing services, and implementing biosafety protocols. These difficulties became the basis for several ethical problems, including uncertainties in case prioritization, increased risks, and heterogeneous professional conduct. The suffering of the workers was explicit, including anguish due to public demands, fear of the pandemic situation, work exhaustion, and managerial neglect.

Keywords
Oral health; Health services; Health professionals; Ethics; Covid-19