Using digital technology to promote physical health in mental healthcare: A sequential mixed‐methods study of clinicians' views

Abstract

AimRecent years have seen innovation in ‘mHealth’ tools and health apps for the management/promotion of physical health and fitness across the general population. However, there is limited research on how this could be applied to mental healthcare. Therefore, we examined mental healthcare professionals' current uses and perceived roles of digital lifestyle interventions for promoting healthy lifestyles, physical health and fitness in youth mental healthcare.MethodsA sequential, mixed‐methods design was used, consisting of a quantitative online survey, followed by qualitative in‐depth interviews.ResultsA total of 127 mental healthcare professionals participated in the online survey. Participants had limited mHealth experience, and the majority agreed that further training would be beneficial. Thirteen mental healthcare professionals were interviewed. Five themes were generated (i) digital technology's ability to enhance the physical healthcare; (ii) Conditions for the acceptability of apps; (iii) Limitations on staff capability and time; (iv) Motivation as the principal barrier; and (v) Practicalities around receiving lifestyle data. Systematic integration of data produced novel insights around: (i) staff involvement and needs; (ii) ideal focus and content of digital lifestyle interventions; and (iii) barriers towards implementation (including mental healthcare professionals own limited experience using digital lifestyle interventions, which aligned with the appeal of formal training).ConclusionsOverall, digital lifestyle interventions were positively received by mental healthcare professionals, particularly for health behaviour‐tracking and mHealth support for exercise and nutrition. Practical suggestions for facilitating their uptake/implementation to improve availability of physical health interventions in mental healthcare are presented.

Digital Lifestyle Interventions for Young People With Mental Illness: A Qualitative Study Among Mental Health Care Professionals

“…MHCPs voiced uncertainties about their own confidence and ability to effectively deliver DLIs. According to our previous work, MHCPs have limited opportunities to use DLIs in their current role [ 15 ], and this is consistent with current literature [ 13 , 25 ]. This may have led MHCPs to perceive a lack of psychological capability (knowledge) to recommend and use apps.…”

“…A mixed methods design was used, including a web-based survey and qualitative interviews, to examine the attitudes of MHCPs toward digital health in young people’s MHC. An overview of the aligned findings of the combined survey and interview components of the project has been presented elsewhere [ 15 ]. While the previous mixed methods analysis provides a foundation for the research presented in this paper, this paper focuses on presenting the results of an in-depth qualitative examination of all the interview data, presenting the subjective experiences and perspectives of MHCPs regarding digital technology.…”

“…Numerous studies have shown that, while MHCPs see the potential benefits, they are concerned about issues of liability, harm to patients, and lack of training regarding using DLIs [ 12 - 14 ]. As the MHCP role primarily focuses on treating mental health difficulties [ 15 ], it is important to explore and compare MHCP beliefs about using digital health for managing symptoms versus delivering lifestyle interventions.…”

Cognitive remediation for schizophrenia: Clinician perspectives on implementation barriers and facilitators.

“…Qualitative methods are relevant for such preliminary investigations (Hamilton & Finley, 2020) and complement trials on efficacy to assess the contextual aspects of real-world implementation (Essay 7 in Raine et al, 2016). Adding a quantitative component allows for the elaboration/enhancement and corroboration of data, in line with mixed methods principles (i.e., respectively, data complementarity, and triangulation; Johnson et al, 2007) and similar to previous health practice studies (Laws et al, 2008;Rayment-Jones et al, 2023;Sawyer et al, 2024). In this study we addressed the following research questions (RQs): (RQ1) How do clinicians perceive their patients' cognitive challenges?…”