engleski

COVID-19 Pandemic and Psycho-social Tele-counselling

Background: The mental health and wellbeing of whole societies have been severely impacted by this crisis. Psychological distress is at a high level due to fear of infections, death, isolation, deep uncertainty about the future, wellbeing and national economics. Objective: The aim of this paper is to analyze resources, human and technological for the installation of tele-health as a first step to minimize mental health consequences of the pandemic. Methods: In this paper we describe how experts from the Medical Informatics at two universities (in Sarajevo and Zagreb), worked on adapting psychological tele-counseling and its application during the COVID-19 and make the healthcare system faster and safer and better responding to the challenges. Results and Discussion: More than 90% of professionals included in the research use Viber or WhatsApp are using those applications in private relations, but only 15% of them for official communication healthcare-related. Less than 10% of mental health and social care institutions have proper ICT user support or monitoring tools and methodology in place. The research discovered that 85% of professionals in the institutions involved consider continuous training as a must for delivering proper telecare. Conclusion: Providing psychological first aid is an essential care component for populations that have been victims of emergencies and disasters, before, during, and after the event.

e-health ; telemedicine ; tele-mental health ; COVID-19

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