Mental health for digital natives in the covid era: Shouldn ’t remote counselling be the first line of engagement & treatment?

The benefits of remote consultation for mental health treatment (Health Europa): Thorbjorg Vigfusdóttir, a cognitive psychologist by training, spent 12 years as a politician in her native Iceland with the goal of directing her knowledge on the development of the brain into education and public policy. After leaving politics to form a company providing remote speech therapy in Icelandic schools, she was founded Kara Connect, an online consultation platform enabling therapists and clinicians to provide remote care and treatment, which was recently adopted by the National University Hospital of Iceland (Landspítali). What are the key benefits of remote treatment for young people in need of mental health support? Young people now are digital natives: they find it useless to go into a physical waiting room and wait to see somebody that they don’t know; they prefer to do it this way. The threshold for getting help is easier when technology is involved; and many young people feel a degree of stigma about accessing mental health support, so it can help to connect online at least in the first instance, before you meet. It helps to build trust between the patient and therapist, for example if somebody is isolated or bullied, of if they need to build trust with child protection services, the technology grants them easier access. It also eliminates the issue of transport: they don’t need to pay for the bus or spend time in a waiting room filled with older people; it’s a complete...
Source: SharpBrains - Category: Neuroscience Authors: Tags: Cognitive Neuroscience Health & Wellness Technology anxiety cognitive psychologist depression digital natives Kara Connect mental health pandemic remote consultation therapists Thorbjorg Vigfusdóttir Source Type: blogs