Conducting a desk review to inform the mental health and psychosocial support response to the 2016 Ecuador earthquake

Abstract

Following the 7.8 magnitude earthquake that struck Ecuador on 16 April 2016, multiple salient public health concerns were raised, including the need to provide mental health and psychosocial support for individual survivors and their communities. The World Health Organization and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees recommend conducting a desk review to summarize existing information, specific to the affected communities, that will support timely, culturally-attuned assessment and delivery of mental health and psychosocial support shortly after the onset of a disaster or humanitarian emergency. The desk review is one component of a comprehensive toolkit designed to inform and support humanitarian actors and their responders in the field. This commentary provides a case example of the development of a desk review that was used to inform personnel responding to the 2016 earthquake in Ecuador. The desk review process is described in addition to several innovations that were introduced to the process during this iteration. Strengths and limitations are discussed, as well as lessons learned and recommendations for future applications.

An integer programming model to assign patients based on mental health impact for tele-psychotherapy intervention during the Covid–19 emergency

“…Previous crisis events, such an earthquakes in Ecuador, showed intervention from NGOs mostly focused on psychosocial support [78,38]. Nevertheless, none of the previous volunteer work has faced the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic.…”

“…[2], Lake and LaBar [29], as these kinds of assignments could lead to anxiety depending on the uncertainty of the weekly number of patients and their needs. Previous crisis events, such an Earthquakes in Ecuador, showed intervention from NGOs mostly focused on psychosocial support [61,27]. Nevertheless, none of the previous volunteer work has faced the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic.…”

An integer programming model to assign patients based on mental health impact for tele-psychotherapy intervention during the Covid–19 emergency

“…Previous crisis events, such an earthquakes in Ecuador, showed intervention from NGOs mostly focused on psychosocial support [ 38 , 78 ]. Nevertheless, none of the previous volunteer work has faced the challenges of the Covid–19 pandemic.…”

Development of consensus quality indicators for cancer supportive care: a Delphi study and pilot testing

“…Desktop audits were conducted concurrently with the interviews (HC) to identify whether data regarding the quality indicators could be feasibly obtained via this mechanism. Desktop audits (also known as ‘desk review’) are commonly used in the global health, humanitarian and environmental sectors, and offer a pragmatic approach to overview relevant documents on a given topic, identify gaps in evidence, and justify primary research or inform questions to be explored through primary research [ 26 , 27 ].…”