NUR2300 Benefits and Risks During the Covid-19 Crisis Assignment Sample

• Subject Code : NUR2300
• University : University of Southern Queensland My Assignment Services is not sponsored or endorsed by this college or university.
• Subject Name : Nursing

In Adults, Is Wearing a Mask Effective for Preventing Human-To-Human Transmission of Airborne Illnesses?

Introduction to Benefits and Risks During the Covid-19 Crisis

One of the major issues nowadays is the pandemic that has increased complication worldwide and COVID has increased the burden over health care due to the gap in the health care resources supply. The increased intensity of the spread of the issue requires urgent attention to improve community health (Pal & Yadav, 2020). Different safety measures have been adopted to improve the safety of the community and one of the most preferred safety measures is the use of the mask in the public. The members in the community are expected to wear a mask to decrease the transmission as major respiratory illness transmits by air droplets (Schünemann et al., 2020). The report is going to discuss the importance of mask in the prevention of airborne illness transmission to improve community health.

Search Strategy

The searched strategy needs to be clear and concise to improve the quality of evidence that can be included in the research. The focused question should be followed by finding the right keywords that effectively improve the quality of the search to improve the article retrieving process (Bramer et al., 2018). The three databases that are utilized to improve the search of the article include PubMed, CINHAL and MEDLINE this increase the quality of the article includes in the study. Different keywords have been utilized to improve the search includes “effectiveness of mask”, “mask reduced airborne transmission” and “mask use to decrease respiratory infection”. The keywords are important to increase the relevancy of the search and Boolean operators are also used to improve the right article to be used in the study.

Level of Evidence

The level of evidence helps the researchers and the reader to identify the quality of the study by identifying the quality of the evidence used in the study. The quality of evidence can be evaluated by the type of study design and then the study design can be compared on the pyramid of the level of evidence to understand the quality of the work (Yetley et al., 2016). The study has used two systemic review article to improve the quality of the work and the systemic review used in the article also include the meta-analysis part that is considered to be best when it comes to the level of evidence. The study presented by Yetley et al. (2016) presented that systemic review is considered to be topmost quality method in the level of the evidence pyramid. The other four articles are literature review that comes in the fourth position of the level of evidence and they also present the rich information concerning the research topic. One of the articles presented by Maggio et al. (2016) added that the literature review presents the high-quality research findings concerning the topic of the research.

Effectiveness of The Mask

A respiratory infection has been a serious threat to the population as it starts from seasonal flu that increases day to day complication of population and end at severe death of the major population due to COVID pandemic. Different non-pharmaceutical interventions have been helping the health care sector to decrease the transmission of the respiratory infection and one of the methods is the use of a face mask. The use of the face mask is considered to be effective in decreasing the forward moment of the air droplets that directly reduce the risk for the transmission of the infection. Different studies have presented that consistent use of face mask has reduced the prevalence of the respiratory infection like influenza up to 30% which is effective in controlling major transmission in the community (Sim et al., 2014). Moreover, the study presented by Azap & Erdinç (2020) discussed that the recent pandemic has increased the threat in the community for the respiratory illness and one of the most discussed topics was the use of personal protective equipment to reduce the risk for transmission. The researcher also presented that mask has been one of the most common types of equipment that have increased population attention due to its effectiveness in reducing the transmission of the infection and stabilizing community health. The study presented that mask has been one of the most important tools to protect the other individual to acquire the infection as the respiratory infection spread via air droplets that can be reduced by using a face mask. The study also added that there are different type of mask that is utilized according to the working setting and intensity of the transmission of infection that can affect the individual. The face mask is an effective option to prevent the transmission of the respiratory like life COVID-19 and there is need to improve the use of the face mask in the setting to improve the community health.

The major route of transmission of the respiratory infection is the air-droplets that travel from one individual to others and leading to the spread of the infection. The method that can be utilized to decrease the prevalence of the respiratory infection is the use of protective equipment and mask is the most generalised method to decrease the transmission. There is a different mask that is used by the population and some of them are N95 mask or surgical mask that has been proving the decreased transmission of the infection to the health care professional as they are most susceptible to acquire infection. There is a need to further research about the effectiveness of the different type of mask in the setting to improve community safety (Smith et al., 2016). Moreover, the study presented by Matuschek et al. (2020) added that use of face mask to decrease the rate of the transmission of the respiratory infection and it has gained the attention of the general population. The face mask helps the individual to be safe from acquiring the infection and it also protects the other individual in the surrounding to be safe. The study depicted that there are different face mask that has been designed to improve the safety of the population and population can prefer the mask as per their preferences. The article presented that chance of acquiring the infection in the public setting is very high thus mask can be used to prevent the community transfer and decrease the major spread of the infection.

One of the studies presented by Chaabna (2020) discussed that surgical mask is effective in reducing the transmission of the respiratory infection and thus should be preferred during patient care. The researcher states that the general population are expected to use the non-medical mask that will help to improve the safety from the infection and it also not increasing complication for the population. The study added that mask is considered to be a good approach to increase safety when there is an issue with the physical distancing which can lead to a negative impact over the health.

Moreover, the study presented by Zhang et al. (2020) discussed that one of the best methods for the prevention of any illness is to decrease the transmission and respiratory infection has major transmission route that is air droplet. The general population are expected to adopt non-pharmacological measure so that they can be protected from acquiring the infection without any side effect of any pharmacological measure. Mask is considered to be one of the most preferred options for the general population due to its accessibility and effectiveness to decrease the transmission of the respiratory infection. The author added that respirators are also used to decrease the transmission of the infection linked with respiratory infection but the effectiveness of the mask is equivalent to it with better accessibility of the general population. The researcher also presented that respirators are considered to be effective for the individual at high risk of acquiring infection as it is costly and need the assistance of the health care professional. Thus, masks are considered to be a more convenient and effective option for reducing the rate of the transmission respiratory illness in the community setting. The use of mask will help to improve the health of the community as it decrease the spread of the infection that will improve the safety of the population at community level. The findings presented reveal there is gap in research about the effectiveness of the different type of mask in community setting and thus in future research there is a need to effectively evaluate the effectiveness of the different type of mask to improve the practice of the general population.

Conclusion on Benefits and Risks During the Covid-19 Crisis

The report can be concluded by adding that mask is one of the effective methods for adults to reduce the chances of the transmission of respiratory infection. The study has used three databases to search the relevant article which includes PubMed, CINHAL and MEDLINE by using the relevant keywords. There is six articles used in the evidence section and out of which 2 are systemic reviews followed by 4 are literature reviews. The evidence presented reveals that mask is one of the effective non-pharmacological methods that can be used to decrease the transmission of the respiratory infection as it decreases the forward movement of the air droplet. The general population are expected to use the non-surgical mask in the community to improve the safety of their own and surrounding population by reducing transmission of the infection.

References for Benefits and Risks During the Covid-19 Crisis

Azap, A. & Erdinç, S. (2020). Medical Mask or N95 Respirator: When And how To Use?. Turkish Journal of Medical Sciences, 50, 633-637. https://doi.org/10.3906/sag-2004-199

Bramer, W. M., de Jonge, G. B., Rethlefsen, M. L., Mast, F. & Kleijnen, J. (2018). A systematic approach to searching: An efficient and complete method to develop literature searches. Journal of the Medical Library Association: JMLA, 106(4), 531–541.  https://doi.org/10.5195/jmla.2018.283

Chaabna, K., Doraiswamy, S., Mamtani, R. & Cheema, S. (2020). Facemask use in community settings to prevent respiratory infection transmission: A rapid review and meta-analysis. International Journal of Infectious Diseases: IJID: Official Publication of the International Society for Infectious Diseases, 1-25. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijid.2020.09.1434

Maggio, L. A., Sewell, J. L. & Artino, A. R., Jr (2016). The literature review: A foundation for high-quality medical education research. Journal of Graduate Medical Education, 8(3), 297–303. https://doi.org/10.4300/JGME-D-16-00175.1

Matuschek, C., Moll, F., Fangerau, H., Fischer, J. C., Zänker, K., van Griensven, M., Schneider, M., Kindgen-Milles, D., Knoefel, W. T., Lichtenberg, A., Tamaskovics, B., Djiepmo-Njanang, F. J., Budach, W., Corradini, S., Häussinger, D., Feldt, T., Jensen, B., Pelka, R., Orth, K., Peiper, M. & Haussmann, J. (2020). Face masks: Benefits and risks during the COVID-19 crisis. European Journal of Medical Research, 25(1), 28-32. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40001-020-00430-5

Pal, R. & Yadav, U. (2020). Covid-19 pandemic in India: Present scenario and a steep climb ahead. Journal of Primary Care & Community Health, 11, 1-4. https://doi.org/10.1177/2150132720939402

Schünemann, H. J., Akl, E. A., Chou, R., Chu, D. K., Loeb, M., Lotfi, T. & Mertz, D. (2020). Use of facemasks during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Lancet Respiratory Medicine. 1-2. https://doi.org/10.1016/s2213-2600(20)30352-0 

Sim, S. W., Moey, K. S. & Tan, N. C. (2014). The use of facemasks to prevent respiratory infection: A literature review in the context of the Health Belief Model. Singapore Medical Journal, 55(3), 160–167.  https://doi.org/ 10.11622/smedj.2014037

Smith, J. D., MacDougall, C. C., Johnstone, J., Copes, R. A., Schwartz, B. & Garber, G. E. (2016). Effectiveness of N95 respirators versus surgical masks in protecting health care workers from acute respiratory infection: a systematic review and meta-analysis. CMAJ : Canadian Medical Association journal = journal de l'Association medicale canadienne, 188(8), 567–574. https://doi.org/10.1503/cmaj.150835

Yetley, E. A., MacFarlane, A. J., Greene-Finestone, L. S., Garza, C., Ard, J. D., Atkinson, S. A. & Wells, G. A. (2016). Options for basing Dietary Reference Intakes (DRIs) on chronic disease endpoints: Report from a joint US-/Canadian-sponsored working group. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 105(1), 249S–285S. https://doi.org/10.3945/ajcn.116.139097 

Zhang, M., Emery, A. R., Tannyhill, R. J., 3rd, Zheng, H. & Wang, J. (2020). Masks or n95 respirators during covid-19 pandemic-which one should I wear?. Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery: Official Journal of the American Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joms.2020.08.024

Remember, at the center of any academic work, lies clarity and evidence. Should you need further assistance, do look up to our Nursing Assignment Help