Three universities create an application to prevent emotional disorders
Researchers from the Universitat de València, Universitat Jaume I of Castellón and Universitat Politècnica de València have developed a program which is self-administered via Internet in order to prevent and to treat emotional disorders. The program named ‘Sonreír es divertido’ combines both the most effective procedures to control anxiety and stress and techniques to promote the emotional regulation, the coping capacity and the resilience.
3 de august de 2017
The tool adds new strategies to improve the positive mood in order to reduce the impact of the emotional disorders. It is carried out through prevention and early treatment, taking care of those who tend to develop these disorders. The program trains the user in different ways to face the problems and get over them without needing a previous preparation.
‘The data obtained are really positive and they support the use of Internet in order to dispense the psychological treatments. It has been demonstrated that this therapy offers a good cost-effect relationship, since according to the World Health Organisation (WHO) the depression is forecasted to be the most important cause of disability in 2030’, highlights Rosa María Baños, full university professor of the Department of Psychological Personality, Evaluation and Treatment of the Universitat de València and participant of this project.
One of the novelties of this tool is its incorporation of positive psychology. According to Adriana Mira Pastor, ‘traditionally the psychological interventions were focused on easing the deficiency and reducing the negative emotions rather than increasing the people’s potentialities, virtues and strengths. That is why we have included these techniques’.
The share of population affected by emotional disorders shows that it is necessary to insist in the use of programs which combine the efficacy of the treatment and the reduction of the health care costs. The interventions self-administered through Internet have become useful tools for both patients and physicians. The main advantages of this tool are that it improves the access to mental healthcare in regions with not many resources, it increases the confidentiality with the patient and it includes multimedia which helps to understand and consolidate the information besides being accessible from several devices, anywhere and anytime.
‘People can graphically see how their emotions change along the treatment. Thanks to these self-administered through Internet programs it is possible to tend to people that would not receive any other help, either because they life in rural areas without specialised health centres or due to the stigma that involves the fact of visiting a psychologist’, explains the researcher.
A controlled and random study has confirmed the efficiency of the treatment ‘Sonreír es divertido’ regarding the improvement of the patient’s clinical situation. The results prove that the interference provoked by the stressful situations is significantly reduced in those people who took part in the program even a year later, in comparison with the control team. The tool is the first program in Spanish with validation studies in the Spanish population.
The treatment protocol counts on eight units aimed to teach several physiological and adaptive techniques to cope with stress. Besides the components of the cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), it includes practical exercises and strategies to improve the positive effect. The patient keeps track with three transversal tools: ‘How am I doing?’ which shows the progress after the finalisation of each module, a calendar where it is stated the frequency of access and the tasks that have been done and an activity diary showing the relationship between the mood and the activities that have been performed.
The new tool, fully developed and prepared to be used in computers and tablets is applicable in several fields: for companies that want to work to prevent the emotional disorders in their staff, at hospitals and centers dedicated to the care of patients with mental problems, for clinical trials and research in clinical psychology and for the public in general. The program is developed within the european project Online Predictive Tools for Intervention in Mental Illness (Optimi), in which these three universities of the Valencian Community participe.
Article:
Adriana Mira; Juan Bretón-López; Azucena García-Palacios; Soledad Quero; Rosa María Baños; Cristina Botella: «An internet-based program for depressive symptoms using human and automated support: a randomized controlled trial». Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment 2017:13 987–1006