Telehealth Treatments of Common Psychological Disorders: An Overview and Meta-analysis

The evidence base for telehealth treatments for mental health has grown substantially in the years following the COVID-19 pandemic. We conducted a narrative synthesis and meta-analysis of reviews investigating the efficacy of live, one-to-one telehealth interventions for common mental disorders.

We conducted a search for systematic reviews of randomized controlled trials or controlled before-and-after studies. Two independent reviewers screened potentially eligible references and extracted data from all eligible reviews. A meta-regression was conducted with reviews containing data suitable for quantitative analysis. A narrative synthesis of results was undertaken for included reviews that did not contain suitable quantitative data.

The search yielded 4180 references, from which 11 eligible reviews were identified. Seven systematic reviews with meta-analyses were included in the meta-regression. Only telehealth interventions for depression and anxiety disorders were identified in the eligible literature. A small significant effect was observed for interventions targeting depression and comparing to active control, where SMD = - 0.316, and p = 0.003.

The results of the meta-regression and narrative synthesis indicate that live one-to-one telehealth produces similar reductions in symptom severity across diagnoses and comparator groups. We identified that most of the research on telehealth for common mental disorders includes low-intensity, self-help tools with reduced clinician involvement, highlighting that much of the research conducted in this area aims at providing care at reduced cost, despite the importance of therapeutic alliance in the provision of mental health care. Investigations of telehealth interventions targeting posttraumatic stress disorder in non-military populations are also needed.