Remote consultations for mental health: patient experiences
What do patients actually think about receiving mental health support via remote consultation? This study gathered patient experiences directly, capturing what worked well, what was difficult, and what they would want to be different. A grounded, patient-centred perspective that clinicians and service designers should read before rolling out or expanding remote mental health services.
Abstract
Objective
An exponential implementation of remote mental health care has been observed, but little data is available on experiences and barriers of remote health from a patient’s perspective. This study investigated experiences associated with several forms of remote consultations (both telephone and online video) for mental health care during the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic with a particular focus on patients’ experiences.
Methods
This study includes results of an online web-based survey filled in by 512 patients on the use and experiences of remote mental health consultations and circulating between March and October 2021.
Results
Psychiatric consultations were initiated by the health care provider in 47.0% of cases, while psychological consultations were most often initiated in shared decision with the patient (54.9%). Only 28.8% of participants mentioned advantages regarding teleconsultations over face-to-face, compared to 39.3% for online video consultations. Moreover, 49.3% saw clear disadvantages for teleconsultations and 32.7% for video consultations. Positive factors associated with remote mental health care included when faced with transportation problems, followed by consultations primarily focusing on medication (for telephone consultations) or on more practical aspects (for video consultations). 25.0% of patients deemed conversations when being angry or sad to be feasible by telephone, and 33.0% considered these feasibly using video consultations.
Conclusion
Remote consultations were deemed feasible, but the positive factors did not seem to outweigh the face-to-face contacts from a patient’s perspective. Remote consultations will probably remain present in the following decades, although care must be taken when providing the possibility of remote mental health care.
Keywords: remote consultations, patient experience, mental health, telepsychology, qualitative
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Reference
Crunelle, C. L., Van Daele, T., Van Laere, S., Blancke, S., Vanderbruggen, N., & Matthys, F. (2022). Remote consultations for mental health: patient experiences. Journal of Community Health. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10900-022-01175-4