Prevalence of Anxiety Symptoms and Associated Clinical and Sociodemographic Factors in Mexican Adults Seeking Psychological Support for Grief During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Cross-Sectional Study.

The COVID-19 pandemic is one of the greatest challenges in modern history, with more than four million confirmed deaths worldwide. To date, evidence regarding the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on grievers is scarce for developing countries such as Mexico. This study aimed to assess the levels of anxiety and associated concerns in a sample of Mexican adults bereaved during the COVID-19 outbreak. A cross-sectional study was conducted through the Duelo COVID (COVID Grief) platform, which is a self-guided online treatment. A total of 5,224 participants reported their anxiety, depression, sleep quality, avoidance, and arousal, prolonged grief symptoms, and medication consumption. Independent sample Mann-Whitney U-tests, chi-square tests, and Kruskal-Wallis tests, as well as multinomial logistic regression, were conducted. Results indicated that 90.4% of the participants reported clinical levels of anxiety, depression, and sleep affectations. The people who lost someone during the last 5 months scored higher in normal grief symptoms compared to the people whose loss was 6 months ago or more, and 9.8% of individuals reported the use of prescription medication, with anxiolytics and antidepressants being the most common. Females, younger respondents, unemployed people with a lower educational level, and participants who disclosed a recent suicide attempt were among those who reported medication consumption. Sleep problems were more frequent in older participants.

Use of EHRs in a Tertiary Hospital During COVID-19 Pandemic: A Multi-Purpose Approach Based on Standards.

This work aims to describe how EHRs have been used to meet the needs of healthcare providers and researchers in a 1,300-beds tertiary Hospital during COVID-19 pandemic. For this purpose, essential clinical concepts were identified and standardized with LOINC and SNOMED CT. After that, these concepts were implemented in EHR systems and based on them, data tools, such as clinical alerts, dynamic patient lists and a clinical follow-up dashboard, were developed for healthcare support. In addition, these data were incorporated into standardized repositories and COVID-19 databases to improve clinical research on this new disease. In conclusion, standardized EHRs allowed implementation of useful multi- purpose data resources in a major Hospital in the course of the pandemic.

A Self-Applied Multi-Component Psychological Online Intervention Based on UX, for the Prevention of Complicated Grief Disorder in the Mexican Population During the COVID-19 Outbreak: Protocol of a Randomized Clinical Trial.

Background: COVID-19 has taken many lives worldwide and due to this, millions of persons are in grief. When the grief process lasts longer than 6 months, the person is in risk of developing Complicated Grief Disorder (CGD). The CGD is related to serious health consequences. To reduce the probability of developing CGD a preventive intervention could be applied. In developing countries like Mexico, the psychological services are scarce, self-applied interventions could provide support to solve this problem and reduce the health impact even after the pandemic has already finished. Aims: To design and implement a self-applied intervention composed of 12 modules focused on the decrease of the risk of developing CGD, and increasing the life quality, and as a secondary objective to reduce the symptomatology of anxiety, depression, and increase of sleep quality. The Intervention Duelo COVID (Grief COVID) follows the principles of User Experience (UX) and is designed according to the needs and desires of a sample of the objective participants, to increase the adherence to the self-applied intervention, considered one of the main weaknesses of online interventions. Methods: A Randomized Controlled Trial will be conducted from the 22nd of December of 2020 to the first of June 2021. The participants will be assigned to an intervention with elements of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Mindfulness and Positive Psychology. The control group will be a wait-list condition, that will receive the intervention 1.5-2 months after the pre-measurement were taken. The Power Size Calculation conducted through G*Power indicated the need for a total of 42 participants, which will be divided by 21 participants in each group. The platform will be delivered through responsive design assuring with this that the intervention will adapt to the screen size of cellphones, tablets, and computers. Ethics and Dissemination: The study counts with the approval of the Research Ethics Committee of the Autonomous University of Ciudad Juárez, México, and it is registered in Clinical Trials (NCT04638842). The article is sent and registered in clinical trials before the recruitment started. The results will be reported in future conferences, scientific publications, and media.