TELEMEDICINE IN PSYCHIATRY: GLOBAL AND DOMESTIC EXPERIENCE
Authors:   Siberian State Medical University, Tomsk, Russia, Bykova Maria , Baranovskaya Svetlana ,   Siberian State Medical University, Tomsk, Russia, Boykov Vadim ,   Siberian State Medical University, Tomsk, Russia, Deev Ivan ,   Federal Research Institute for Health Organization and Informatics of Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia, Kobyakova Olga ,   Federal Research Institute for Health Organization and Informatics of Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia, Sirotina Alina ,   Siberian State Medical University, Tomsk, Russia, Shibalkov Ivan ,   Federal Research Institute for Health Organization and Informatics of Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia
Published: December 2023

Significance. The use of telemedicine technologies can solve the existing problems of accessibility of medical care and become a supplement or alternative to face-to-face consultations with specialists. The active use of telemedicine technologies in psychiatry is mainly due to the fact, that most often, patients with mental disorders do not require instrumental methods of diagnosis to correct their treatment and assess the course of the disease. Despite a widespread use and obvious benefits of telemedicine technologies, there are still a number of issues that require a detailed study. The key issue is the assessment of efficacy of tools used to treat and diagnose patients with mental disorders, as well as identification of factors that contribute to and limit the spread of telemedicine technologies in psychiatry. The purpose of the study is to summarize and analyze available data on the use of telemedicine technologies in treatment and diagnosis of patients with mental disorders in Russia and in the world. Material and Methods. This review includes studies published between 2001 and 2022. The search for publications was carried out in the databases PubMed, Google Scholar, Elibrary. The keywords included "remote monitoring of mental disorder", "telepsychiatry in COVID-19", "platform for monitoring mental disorders", "telemedicine in psychiatry", "remote monitoring in psychiatry". A total of 218 704 publications were found. After the initial screening, 100 sources were selected for the analysis. Of these, 60 were excluded due to a smaller sample size compared to the included sources, absence or incompleteness of information necessary to realize the idea of the publication. In total, 40 publications were included in the analysis with their content corresponding to the main research question: to identify main direct and indirect advantages of using telemedicine technologies in psychiatry. Results. The analysis of the experience of using telemedicine technologies in psychiatry shows that the use of technologies for remote monitoring in practical medicine expands the capabilities of both doctor and patient, allowing them to monitor the state of health and adjust treatment, as well as receive consultations from other specialists, reducing the number of face-to-face visits to a medical facility. However, today there are a number of challenges that the professional community has to face, including safety assurance of patient data and quality assessment of remote consultations on the part of the doctor and on the part of the patient. In order to ensure a widespread use and dissemination of telemedicine in psychiatry, it is necessary to solve the issues related to identification and authentication of telemedicine consultation participants, development of a list of conditions for which the use of telepsychiatry will be justified and safe for the patient, regulation of the procedure for prescribing medications and correction of the prescribed therapy, as well as identification of approaches to selecting platform solutions for remote counseling.