e-Health for Traumatized Refugees: A Scoping Review

Area of Science:

• Mental Health
• Public Health
• Digital Health

Background:

• Refugees experience high rates of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) due to traumatic experiences and resettlement challenges.
• Traditional mental health services face barriers like cost, accessibility, and resource limitations for traumatized refugees.
• Electronic health (e-health) offers a potential solution to bridge these gaps in care delivery.

Purpose of the Study:

• To conduct a scoping review on the current evidence of e-health interventions for screening and treating PTSD in refugees.
• To examine the benefits and challenges associated with using e-health for this population.
• To identify future research directions in refugee mental healthcare.

Main Methods:

• A comprehensive scoping review was performed following Arksey and O'Malley's established 6-stage framework.
• A systematic search identified 2,782 articles, with 8 studies ultimately included in the final analysis.
• Due to study heterogeneity, a qualitative examination of individual study findings was conducted.

Main Results:

• Smartphones were the most frequently utilized technology in the reviewed studies (n=5).
• Telephonic screening for PTSD demonstrated comparable efficacy to in-person assessments.
• All evaluated smartphone and internet-based interventions reported high feasibility and user acceptability.

Conclusions:

• E-health presents a novel and scalable platform for delivering mental healthcare in resource-limited settings.
• Further large-scale, robust studies are needed to explore PTSD-targeted, theory-based e-health approaches.
• Future research should investigate diverse technological formats, including video conferencing and virtual reality.