Digital Mental Health Interventions for Adolescent and Youth during COVID-19 Pandemic

Dear Colleagues, 

This Special Issue on digital mental health interventions to COVID-19 mental health integrates theoretical and methodological approaches from complex systems and social and dynamic network analysis in proposing cyber interventions for creating resilient mental health service delivery networks. It will offer empirical validation, testing and adaptive capacity of the DMHI (digital mental health interventions) for positive mental health outcomes in Nebraska. The COVID-CAN (coronavirus-19 community needs assessment) and COVID-CSA (coronavirus-19 community service delivery assessment) will allow for adolescent and youth mental health data collection through school partnerships from a sample from rural schools of the 93 counties in Nebraska. Existing quantification and evaluation networks together with the re-design of new networks of multi-layered hierarchical, ad hoc and informal community-based COVID-19 mental health service delivery will be achieved for optimal coordinated resilience through a transformation of communication using digital interventions.

The prevalence of a wide range of mental health disorders for adolescent and youth in the age group of 12-24 years are considered as a significant global public health challenge. Thirty-one percent of adolescents and youth suffer from anxiety disorders, which accounts for almost 1 in every 4 to 5 youth having some degree of mental disorder in the continental U.S. This has been magnified due to COVID-19 shutdowns of schools, colleges and public support institutions and social distancing recently affecting adolescent and youth. Rural America represents approximately one fourth of all the U.S. population residing in small towns, villages and the countryside with large health disparities where mental health disorders are considered as one of the four most important health issues. In rural America, approximately three quarters of rural areas lack psychiatrists and about 96% lack proper child psychiatrists, leading to a very significant lack of ability to support adolescents and youth facing mental health issues due to a lack of availability, accessibility, and acceptability of mental health services. In rural Nebraska, only 48 out of 93 counties are reported to have mental health care providers that are disjointed, which can be attributed to limiting the efficacy of COVID-19 mental health services for youths and also increasing the vulnerability of the youth with significant mental health needs. The overarching goal of this study is to find: How can different types of hierarchical, ad hoc and community-based informal organizational communications network structures enabled by digital interventions create resilience networks for improving COVID-19 coordination among service providers responsible for dealing with adolescent and youth mental health in Nebraska, and also in the rest of the U.S.?

The evidence to be delivered from this computationally driven empirical study will have the following five aims:

Aim 1: Develop and deploy digital COVID-CAN (coronavirus-19 community needs assessment) and COVID-CSA (coronavirus-19 community service delivery assessment) for adolescent and youth mental health through school partnerships from a sample of rural schools from the 93 counties in Nebraska during the COVID-19 pandemic;

Aim 2: Quantify and evaluate existing networks of communication in multi-layered hierarchical, ad hoc and informal community-based mental health service delivery systems;

Aim 3: Design new networks for achieving optimal coordinated resilience through a transformation of communication using digital interventions within and among hierarchical, ad hoc and community-based informal organizations;

Aim 4: Develop a state-level digital mental health system for achieving a shared knowledge base in the delivery of COVID-19 mental health services using a holistic systems approach;

Aim 5: Conduct empirical validation, testing and adaptive capacity of digital interventions to achieve positive COVID-19 mental health outcomes in rural Nebraska.

This research on digitally coordinated mental health resilience networks integrates theoretical and methodological approaches derived from complex cyber systems and social and dynamic network analysis in proposing cyber interventions for creating resilient COVID-19 mental health service delivery networks, which can also help mental health professionals in determining the most efficient means to reach target populations. It promotes new ways to design, implement and improve public and mental health practices related to the digitally coordinated mental health interventions for adolescents and youth in a rural and urban setting.

Prof. Dr. Liaquat Hossain
Guest Editor

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• digital COVID-CAN
• COVID-CSA
• mental health
• digital interventions