ABSTRACT
Introduction: While online consultations have shown promise to be a means for the effective delivery of high-quality mental healthcare and the first implementations of these digital therapeutic contacts go back nearly two decades, uptake has remained limited over the years. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic dramatically altered this relative standstill and created a unique turning point, with a massive amount of both professionals and clients having first hands-on experiences with technology in mental healthcare. Objective: The current study aimed to document the uptake of online consultations and explore if specific characteristics of mental health professionals across and beyond Europe could predict this. Methods: An international survey was designed to assess mental health professionals' (initial) experiences with online consultations at the onset of the pandemic: their willingness to make use of them and their prior and current experiences, alongside several personal characteristics. Logistic mixed-effects models were used to identify predictors of the use of online consultations, personal experience with this modality, and the sense of telepresence. Results: A total of 9115 healthcare professionals from 73 countries participated of which about two-thirds used online consultations during the initial COVID-19 outbreak. The current study identifies multiple determinants relating to the use and experience of online consultations, including the professionals' age, experience with the technology before the outbreak, the professional context, and training. Conclusions: Despite strong evidence supporting the relevance of training in digital mental health, this is clearly still lacking. Nevertheless, the COVID-19 pandemic presented a first, and potentially transformative, experience with online consultations for many healthcare professionals. The insights from this study can help support professionals and, importantly, (mental) healthcare organisations to create optimal circumstances for selective and high-quality continued use of online consultations.
ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has a severe impact on the general population. During the pandemic, children may develop emotional and psychological symptoms, including increased worries about health and illness, known as health anxiety symptoms (HASs). We aimed to explore HAS in 7-9-year-old children from the Danish Odense Child Cohort (OCC) during the first COVID-19 lockdown period in Denmark, and to examine associations with potential risk factors. MATERIAL AND METHODS: OCC is a cohort of children born between 2010 and 2012, which originally recruited 2874 of 6707 pregnancies (43%). Among the current OCC population of 2430 singleton children, 994 participated in this study (response rate 40%). Children and their parents filled out questionnaires about child HAS, family exposure to COVID-19 infection and parental HAS. Adjusted odds ratios (aORs) were calculated between high score child HAS (≥90th percentile) and covariates by use of logistic regression. RESULTS: Most children (n = 686, 69%) reported few worries about their health. Children reporting high score HAS also had higher levels of internalizing symptoms at age 5; aOR 2.15 (1.20;3.85), p = .010, and higher levels of maternal and paternal HAS; aOR 2.40 (1.44;3.97), p = .001, and 2.00 (1.10;3.65), p = .023, whereas no association with child sex or familial exposure to COVID-19 was detected (n = 65, 6.5%). CONCLUSIONS: High score child HAS during the first lockdown period of the COVID-19 pandemic was not associated with family exposure to COVID-19 infection, but to being a more anxious child a priori and to HAS in parents.