Mental health services witness major shift towards telepsychiatry

Visakhapatnam: In the past two years, mental health services have seen a major shift towards adopting telepsychiatry care for apparent reasons. Saving time and travel cost, the digital healthcare has turned into an effective tool to reach out to the patients located at far flung places, provide treatment by protecting their anonymity and put them at ease.

These were some of the points highlighted by a host of experts who arrived from different parts of the country and abroad to take part in the three-day-long 73rd Annual National Conference of the Indian Psychiatric Society – 2022 (ANCIPS) that began in hybrid mode in Visakhapatnam on Thursday. Highlighting the stigma associated with mental health, founder and director of Hope Care Deepak Raheja explained how the metropolitan cities have slowly come out of the cocoon.

"However, there is still a long way to go for the stigma to disappear totally from society. Tele-consultation has now been embraced by many patients as it allows them to ventilate their emotions in a convenient setting. They feel much safer and comfortable to uncork their welled-up emotions through the platform," observes Dr Deepak. Elaborating about the common mental health issues cropped up in Australia in recent times, president of Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists Vinay Lakra, said, "Both Federal government and state-based health services have shifted towards telepsychiatry during the pandemic.

Although nothing could replace the direct contact of the patient, tele-health will now become a long term option. According to the recent data of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, the graph of psychological distress went up during lockdown time which was imposed for longer spells in Melbourne compared to the rest of the countries.

When the lockdowns were relaxed, the curve eventually flattened. Symptoms of anxiety and depression topped the list of complaints among people for a shorter period. Among young people, incidents of self-harm turned out to be common at that point of time," explains the Melbourne-based doctor. Expressing concern over the widening gap between generations, Lokayukta of Andhra Pradesh Justice P Lakshmana Reddy, who attended the conference as chief guest, explained the importance of psychiatry, how it is applicable in day-to-day life and laws associated with it.

Also, he underlined the need to shun mental illness stigma and seek medical assistance without any reluctance. Stressing on the therapeutic alliance that plays an imperative part for the patients, the experts spoke about alternative healing therapies, spiritual counselling, the need to build trust and help patients gain access to quality mental healthcare and expanding the horizons of telepsychiatry that has been diversified in recent times.

With so much digital content being exchanged with the patients, the psychiatrists also laid emphasis on adherence to the HIPAA (Health Insurance of Portability and Accountability Act) rules.