Accepted for/Published in: Journal of Medical Internet Research
Date Submitted: Oct 26, 2022
Date Accepted: Feb 27, 2023
Date Submitted to PubMed: Mar 6, 2023
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
The efficacy and usability of an unguided online grief intervention for people who lost a loved one during the COVID-19 pandemic: A Randomized Controlled Trial
ABSTRACT
Background:
The death of loved ones during the COVID-19 pandemic was a challenge people faced in this historical period. Although grief for most people is a natural process that resolves itself, for some, it becomes a painful process with clinical correlates that may require professional help for its resolution. We developed an unguided online psychological intervention to provide psychological support to people who lost a loved one during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Objective:
The main objective of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of online treatment in reducing clinical symptoms of complicated grief, depression, post-traumatic stress, hopelessness, anxiety, and suicidal risk in adults.
Methods:
We used a randomized controlled trial with an intervention group and a waiting list control group. The groups were assessed three times (before entering, after finishing the intervention, and three months later). As a secondary aim, we evaluated the usability of the system.
Results:
For the intervention group, the results indicated that treatment significantly reduced baseline clinical symptoms for all variables, with larger effect sizes for depression, hopelessness, grief, anxiety, and risk of suicide (all effect sizes ≥ 0.5). The participants in the control group significantly decreased hopelessness levels after the waiting list but increased their suicidal risk scores. The follow-up evaluation showed that symptom reduction was maintained. Participants rated the intervention as a highly usability system.
Conclusions:
These results show the importance of developing online psychological tools to reduce clinical symptoms in people going through a grief process derived from the loss of a loved one in times of pandemic. Clinical Trial: Trial Registration: The study is registered in Clinical trials (NCT04638842).
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