Experiences of researchers in navigating applied research in the MENA region: an exploratory online cross-sectional survey.

Against the COVID-19 pandemic, global society faced unprecedented trials — the medical and health sector served as the anti-epidemic frontline, while the prison system was also plunged into intense challenges. Reports show most Chinese prison staff adopted a closed-duty model: for example, all prisons in Guangdong implemented the highest-level duty system from 00:00 on February 22, 2020, with no rotation of on-duty police in supervision areas for nearly 2 months []. A survey indicates 72.9% of police officers deemed pandemic prevention risks, regulatory safety pressures, and standardized law enforcement demands beyond expectations [], meaning their workloads far exceeded normal levels. For multi-role staff (doctors, nurses, special-duty police) at a Chongqing prison hospital, challenges were particularly acute. As a group with the dual identity of medical staff and prison personnel, they face the dual pressure of medical treatment and prison management for a long time, and such a special occupational characteristic makes the role of resilience particularly critical for them in resisting job burnout. Relevant studies have confirmed that psychological resilience can effectively mediate the negative impact of work pressure on the mental health of prison police, who represent a typical high-stress occupational group with relatively low mental health levels []. For medical staff, psychological resilience has also been identified as a key factor in helping them cope with pandemic-related work pressure, such as shortages of protective materials and heavy diagnosis and treatment tasks []. However, existing studies mostly focus on single-identity groups such as prison police or ordinary medical staff, and lack targeted empirical research on the dual-identity group of prison hospital staff in public health emergencies, especially regarding their psychological resilience in response to increasingly prominent job burnout. This research gap makes it impossible to formulate precise psychological intervention strategies for this special group, which constitutes the core necessity of the present study. Prison hospitals inherently possess their own distinctiveness, bearing the dual responsibilities of offering routine medical care and catering to the unique management requirements of the prison setting. They function within a year-round closed duty framework, devoid of mobile phones, computers, or other communication devices, and with restricted activities. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has exponentially increased their work pressure. Doctors must not only diagnose and treat potential COVID-19 cases with professional knowledge but also continuously monitor and treat a variety of other diseases, ensuring the quality of medical services under limited medical resources. Nurses have to stay on the front lines of care, performing high-intensity nursing procedures while strictly implementing various nursing protocols for epidemic prevention and control. As employees with the identity of police officers, in addition to maintaining the security and order of the prison, they must also assist the medical team in carrying out prevention and control work to ensure the stable operation of the prison during the pandemic. For this group, their occupational resilience is closely related to workplace support and pressure recovery ability. A two-year prospective cohort study on medical staff during the pandemic found that colleague support, workplace trust, and pressure recovery ability are key factors affecting occupational resilience []. This also implies that the closed working environment of prison hospitals, which limits external contact, may affect the formation of their resilience by weakening social support channels, which further highlights the necessity of exploring their resilience.