Anxiety and Death Anxiety Levels of Nurses in the COVID-19 Pandemic and Affecting Factors Deniz Yiğit Ayfer Açıkgöz Department of Child Health and Disease Nursing, Eskişehir Osmangazi University School of Health Sciences, Eskişehir, Turkey Abstract Background: The aim of this study was to determine the anxiety and death anxiety levels of nurses during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic and the affecting factors. Methods: This descriptive and cross-sectional study was carried out online with 617 nurs- es. Data were collected using the introductory information form, Beck Anxiety Inventory, and Death Anxiety Scale. The descriptive statistics Spearman, Mann-Whitney U, and Kruskal-Wallis H tests were used to evaluate the data. A P-value < .05 was considered significant in the study. Results: In the study, it was determined that anxiety (41.72 ± 8.91) and death anxiety (11.58 ± 2.59) levels of nurses were high. A total of 78.4% of the nurses stated that they were afraid of infection, and 96.1% were afraid of carrying an infection to their family. It was found that 53.2% of the nurses had psychological needs and that these individuals had higher anxiety and death anxiety (P < .001). A statistically significant difference was found between the total number of children of the nurses, the need for psychological support, the negative effect of their working conditions on their children, and the anxiety and death anxiety scores (P < .05). Conclusion: As a result of the study, it was determined that the anxiety and death anxiety levels of nurses were high. It has been determined that nurses are afraid of being infected and carrying infections to their families. It was found that nurses needed psychological support during this period, and their children were also affected by this process. Our recommendation is to take into account the factors that adversely affect nurses during the pandemic process and to take initiatives to provide the necessary support. Keywords: COVID-19, coronavirus, corona, pandemic, nurse 85 JERN Journal of Education and Research in Nursing Original Article DOI: 10.5152/jern.2021.35683 Yiğit D, Açıkgöz A. Anxiety and Death Anxiety Levels of Nurses in the COVID-19 Pandemic and Affecting Factors. J Educ Res Nurs. 2021;18(Supp. 1): 85-92. Received: June 14, 2020 Accepted: November 30, 2020 Copyright@Author(s) - Available online at www.jer-nursing.org Content of this journal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Corresponding Author: Deniz Yiğit E-mail: yigitdenizyigit@gmail.com Introduction A pandemic is defined as an epidemic of a disease that is seen in more than one continent in the world and affects many countries. 1 Many epidemics have been declared pandemics from past to present. Some pandemics include diseases such as plague, avian influenza, small- pox, and swine flu. The recent epidemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) (Deaths of Coronavirus Disease-19, 2019-nCoV), has also been declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization. 2 COVID-19 is a disease caused by coronaviruses (CoVs). CoVs constitute a large family of viruses that cause many diseases, from the common cold to severe respiratory distress. 1,2 COVID-19 was first detected in humans in Wuhan, China in December 2019 and has spread throughout the world. 2-4 The vast majority of patients with COVID-19 (about 80%) can recover without needing hospital treatment. However, approximately one out of every five people diagnosed with COVID-19 goes through a severe disease course and has difficulty in breathing. In particular, elderly individuals and those with chronic diseases, such as hypertension and heart and lung diseases, are at high risk. 4 The COVID-19 process is not yet fully known. Close contact has the greatest risk of transmission, 4 and the disease has caused many deaths. This has negatively affected people all over the world. 5 Health workers have important responsibilities in the fight against the disease. 3 During the pandemic, the increase in the number of patients in need of care has increased the workload of health workers. 6 The fact that the disease is transmitted through close contact has also increased the anxiety of the health workers who directly work with patients. In particular, nurses spend most of their time with patients and work in close contact. 7-9 This may increase nurses’ anxiety and lead them to experience death anxiety. 10,11 Nurses should be supported psychologically and physically to ensure they provide good care to patients in all aspects. 10,12 The first thing to do at this point is to determine nurses’ death anxiety and anxiety levels and provide the necessary support by identifying the causes. 13,14 Aim This study was conducted to determine the anxiety and death anxiety levels of nurses during the COVID-19 pandemic and the affecting factors.