Perceived helpfulness of treatment for specific phobia: Findings from the World Mental Health Surveys

Author(s):Show less -

de Vries, Ymkje Anna ^{[1, 2]} ; Harris, Meredith G. ^{[3, 4]} ; Vigo, Daniel ^{[5, 6]} ; Chiu, Wai Tat ^[7] ; Sampson, Nancy A. ^[7] ; Al-Hamzawi, Ali ^[8] ; Alonso, Jordi ^{[9, 10, 11]} ; Andrade, Laura H. ^{[12, 13]} ; Benjet, Corina ^[14] ; Bruffaerts, Ronny ^[15] ; Bunting, Brendan ^[16] ; de Almeida, Jose Miguel Caldas ^{[17, 18]} ; de Girolamo, Giovanni ^[19] ; Florescu, Silvia ^[20] ; Gureje, Oye ^[21] ; Haro, Josep Maria ^{[22, 23]} ; Hu, Chiyi ^{[24, 25]} ; Karam, Elie G. ^{[26, 27]} ; Kawakami, Norito ^[28] ; Kovess-Masfety, Viviane ^[29] ; Lee, Sing ^[30] ; Moskalewicz, Jacek ^[31] ; Navarro-Mateu, Fernando ^[32] ; Ojagbemi, Akin ^[33] ; Villa, Jose Pusada ^{[34, 35]} ; Scott, Kate ^[36] ; Torres, Yola ^[37] ; Zarkov, Zahari ^[38] ; Nierenberg, Andrew ^{[39, 40]} ; Kessler, Ronald C. ^[7] ; de Jonge, Peter ^[1] ; Colla, WHO World Mental Hlth Survey

Affiliation:Show less -

^[1] Univ Groningen, Dept Dev Psychol, Groningen - Netherlands

^[2] Univ Med Ctr Groningen, Interdisciplinary Ctr Psychopathol & Emot Regulat, Groningen - Netherlands

^[3] Univ Queensland, Sch Publ Hlth, Herston, Qld 4006 - Australia

^[4] Queensland Ctr Mental Hlth Res, Pk Ctr Mental Hlth, Brisbane, Qld 4072 - Australia

^[5] Univ British Columbia, Dept Psychiat, Vancouver, BC - Canada

^[6] Harvard Med Sch, Dept Global Hlth & Social Med, Boston, MA 02115 - USA

^[7] Harvard Med Sch, Dept Hlth Care Policy, Boston, MA 02115 - USA

^[8] Al Qadisiya Univ, Coll Med, Diwaniya Governorate - Iraq

^[9] Pompeu Fabra Univ UPF, Barcelona - Spain

^[10] CIBER Epidemiol & Salud Publ CIBERESP, Madrid - Spain

^[11] IMIM Hosp del Mar Med Res Inst, Hlth Serv Res Unit, Barcelona - Spain

^[12] Univ Sao Paulo, Nucleo Epidemiol Psiquiatr LIM 23, Inst Psiquiatr, Hosp Clin, Fac Med, Sao Paulo - Brazil

^[13] Univ Sao Paulo, Med Sch, Inst Psychiat, Sect Psychiat Epidemiol LIM 23, Sao Paulo - Brazil

^[14] Natl Inst Psychiat Ramon Fuente Muniz, Dept Epidemiol & Psychosocial Res, Mexico City, DF - Mexico

^[15] Katholieke Univ Leuven UPC KUL, Univ Psychiat Ctr, Campus Gasthuisberg, Leuven - Belgium

^[16] Ulster Univ, Sch Psychol, Coleraine, Londonderry - North Ireland

^[17] Univ Nova Lisboa, Chron Dis Res Ctr CEDOC, NOVA Med Sch, Fac Ciencias Med, Lisbon - Portugal

^[18] Univ Nova Lisboa, Lisbon Inst Global Mental Hlth, Lisbon - Portugal

^[19] IRCCS Ist Ctr San Giovanni Dio Fatebenefratell, Brescia - Italy

^[20] Natl Sch Publ Hlth Management & Dev, Bucharest - Romania

^[21] Univ Coll Hosp, Dept Psychiat, Ibadan - Nigeria

^[22] Univ Barcelona, Parc Sanitari Sant Joan Deu, CIBERSAM, Barcelona - Spain

^[23] King Saud Univ, Dept Psychol, Coll Educ, Riyadh - Saudi Arabia

^[24] Shenzhen Inst Mental Hlth, Shenzhen - Peoples R China

^[25] Shenzhen Kangning Hosp, Shenzhen - Peoples R China

^[26] Inst Dev Res Advocacy & Appl Care IDRAAC, Beirut - Lebanon

^[27] Balamand Univ, St George Hosp Univ, Dept Psychiat & Clin Psychol, Fac Med, Med Ctr, Beirut - Lebanon

^[28] Univ Tokyo, Sch Publ Hlth, Dept Mental Hlth, Tokyo - Japan

^[29] Paris Descartes Univ, Ecole Hautes Etud Sante Publ EHESP, EA 4057, Paris - France

^[30] Chinese Univ Hong Kong, Dept Psychiat, Tai Po, Hong Kong - Peoples R China

^[31] Inst Psychiat & Neurol, Warsaw - Poland

^[32] CIBERESP Murcia, UDIF SM, Serv Murciano Salud, IMIB Arrixaca, Murcia, Region De Murci - Spain

^[33] Univ Ibadan, Dept Psychiat, Ibadan - Nigeria

^[34] Cundinamarca Univ, Fac Social Sci, Colegio Mayor, Bogota - Colombia

^[35] Cundinamarca Univ, Calle 28 5B 02, Bogota 11001000 - Colombia

^[36] Univ Otago, Dept Psychol Med, Dunedin, Otago - New Zealand

^[37] CES Univ, Ctr Excellence Res Mental Hlth, Medellin - Colombia

^[38] Natl Ctr Publ Hlth & Anal, Dept Mental Hlth, Sofia - Bulgaria

^[39] Harvard Med Sch, Boston, MA 02115 - USA

^[40] Massachusetts Gen Hosp, Dept Psychiat, Dauten Family Ctr Bipolar Treatment Innovat, Boston, MA 02114 - USA

• Document type: Journal article
• Source: Journal of Affective Disorders; v. 288, p. 199-209, JUN 1 2021.
• Web of Science Citations: 0

Abstract

Background: Although randomized trials show that specific phobia treatments can be effective, it is unclear whether patients experience treatment as helpful in clinical practice. We investigated this issue by assessing perceived treatment helpfulness for specific phobia in a cross-national epidemiological survey. Methods: Cross-sectional population-based WHO World Mental Health (WMH) surveys in 24 countries (n=112,507) assessed lifetime specific phobia. Respondents who met lifetime criteria were asked whether they ever received treatment they considered helpful and the number of professionals seen up to the time of receiving helpful treatment. Discrete-event survival analysis was used to calculate conditional-cumulative probabilities of obtaining helpful treatment across number of professionals seen and of persisting in help-seeking after prior unhelpful treatment. Results: 23.0% of respondents reported receiving helpful treatment from the first professional seen, whereas cumulative probability of receiving helpful treatment was 85.7% after seeing up to 9 professionals. However, only 14.7% of patients persisted in seeing up to 9 professionals, resulting in the proportion of patients ever receiving helpful treatment (47.5%) being much lower than it could have been with persistence in help-seeking. Few predictors were found either of perceived helpfulness or of persistence in help-seeking after earlier unhelpful treatments. Limitations: Retrospective recall and lack of information about either types of treatments received or objective symptomatic improvements limit results. Conclusions: Despite these limitations, results suggest that helpfulness of specific phobia treatment could be increased, perhaps substantially, by increasing patient persistence in help-seeking after earlier unhelpful treatments. Improved understanding is needed of barriers to help-seeking persistence. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 03/00204-3 - Epidemiological study of psychiatric disorders in the São Paulo Metropolitan Region: prevalence, risk factors, and social and economical burden
• Grantee: Laura Helena Silveira Guerra de Andrade
• Support Opportunities: Research Projects - Thematic Grants