Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on remote mental healthcare and prescribing in psychiatry: an electronic health record study.

ABSTRACT:

Objectives

The recent COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted mental healthcare delivery, with many services shifting from in-person to remote patient contact. We investigated the impact of the pandemic on the use of remote consultation and on the prescribing of psychiatric medications.

Design and setting

The Clinical Record Interactive Search tool was used to examine deidentified electronic health records of people receiving mental healthcare from the South London and Maudsley (SLaM) NHS Foundation Trust. Data from the period before and after the onset of the pandemic were analysed using linear regression, and visualised using locally estimated scatterplot smoothing.

Participants

All patients receiving care from SLaM between 7 January 2019 and 20 September 2020 (around 37 50

SUBMITTER: Patel R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8728386 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature