Description of a telehealth mental health programme in the framework of the COVID-19 pandemic in Colombia.

BACKGROUND

A telehealth mental health programme was designed at the LivingLab of the Faculty of Medicine of the Universidad de Antioquia [University of Antioquia].

OBJECTIVES

To describe the development and operation of the programme and evaluate the satisfaction of the patients treated during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021.

METHODS

Descriptive study that details the development of the programme. Data were extracted from medical records to describe the patients who were treated. A satisfaction scale was applied to a random sample and the data were summarised with descriptive statistics.

RESULTS

In March 2020 and August 2021, 10,229 patients were treated, with 20,276 treated by telepsychology and 4,164 by psychiatry, 1,808 by telepsychiatry and 2,356 by tele-expertise, with a total of 6,312 visits. The most frequent diagnoses were depressive (36.8%), anxiety (12.0%), and psychotic (10.7%) disorders. Respondents were satisfied to the point that more than 93% would recommend it to another person.

CONCLUSIONS

The LivingLab telehealth mental health programme allowed for the care of patients with mental health problems and disorders in Antioquia during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, and there was a high degree of satisfaction among the beneficiaries. Therefore it could be adopted in mental health care.