TY - JOUR AU - Protudjer, Jennifer LP AU - Gruber, Jackie AU - MacKay, Dylan AU - Larcombe, Linda PY - 2022/01/04 Y2 - 2024/03/28 TI - Paying the price? Academic work and parenting during COVID-19 JF - Canadian Medical Education Journal JA - Can. Med. Ed. J VL - 13 IS - 2 SE - Original Research DO - 10.36834/cmej.72873 UR - https://journalhosting.ucalgary.ca/index.php/cmej/article/view/72873 SP - 13-17 AB - <p><strong>Introduction:</strong> The shift to remote working/learning to slow transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus has had widespread mental health impacts. We aimed to describe how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the mental health of students and faculty within a health sciences faculty at a central Canadian university.</p><p><strong>Methods:</strong> Via an online survey, we queried mental health in the first four months of the COVID-19 pandemic quantitatively (scale: 1 (most negative)-100 (most positive)) and qualitatively.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>The sample (<em>n </em>= 110) was predominantly women (faculty 39/59; [66.1%]; students 46/50; [92.0%]). Most faculty were married/common law (50/60; [84.8%]) and had children at home (36/60; [60.0%]); the opposite was true for most students. </p><p>Faculty and students self-reported comparable mental health (40.47±24.26 and 37.62±26.13; respectively). Amongst women, those with vs. without children at home, reported significantly worse mental health impacts (31.78±23.68 vs. 44.29±27.98; respectively, <em>p </em>= 0.032).</p><p>Qualitative themes included: “Sharing resources,” “spending money,” “few changes,” for those without children at home; “working at home can be isolating,” including the subtheme, “balancing act”: “working in isolation,” “working more,” for those with children at home.</p><p><strong>Discussion: </strong>Amongst women in academia, including both students and faculty, those with children at home have disproportionately worse mental health than those without children at home.</p> ER -