**1. Introduction**

The term "stress" was derived from the Latin word "stringere," meaning the experience of physical hardship, starvation, torture, and pain. Its chronic form is termed 'Burnout.' Stress at the workplace has gained much attention recently. It has been recognized as a global disease due to its negative impact on the physical, emotional, and psychological well-being of people in various occupational groups.

Stress has become an endemic problem in healthcare, contributing to healthrelated challenges which decrease efficiency and productivity. Stress among health care workers is multifactorial. The mismatch between job requirement and the available resources, work overload, working environment, work experience, workplace conflict, gender discrimination, marital status, educational status, job satisfaction, and not being rewarded were some of the factors significantly associated with

occupational stress among health care professionals [1]. Moreover, the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic introduced additional stressors, such as staff redeployment and the fear of infection [2]. Occupational stress is a significant reason for physical and mental health, substance use, work-related delay, absenteeism, and emigration rate [3, 4]. World Health Organization (WHO) recognized good primary health care as fundamental for achieving universal health coverage (UHC) without financial hardship [5]. Healthcare professionals' physical and mental well-being is crucial for attaining this [1]. Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) is still the gold standard for assessing burnout among HCWs [6]. Developing culturally and organizationally appropriate early interventions is the need of the hour to prevent a health care worker from entering a stress level that is non-adaptable beyond their coping abilities.
