Dealing with depression and anxiety can be difficult in the best of times, and that's proved even more challenging over the last unprecedented year and a half.
A new study from Psychiatric Services found that over a quarter of U.S. adults experiencing depression and anxiety weren’t able to receive the counseling they needed during the pandemic.
The study analyzed census data from 70,000 adults across the U.S. in September of last year during both the height of the pandemic and when many people were unable to travel to see their families for the holidays.
Research showed a surge in mental health needs for all ages.
“These trends… (are) due to social isolation, COVID-related anxiety, job loss, disruption in normal routines,” Dr. Jason Nagata, Assistant Professor of the Department of Pediatrics at UCSF, told KCBS Radio on Thursday.
Dr. Nagata, who co-authored the study, said what’s compounding the rise in depression is the lack of mental health service availability.
“There’s been a huge surge of need and not enough providers to meet that need at this point,” he explained.
That data only represents people willing to admit that they have symptoms of depression and anxiety. There could be more who experienced symptoms but didn’t acknowledge them during the survey.
What can be done to increase access to mental health services amid this spike?
“One silver lining of the pandemic is that a lot of providers have moved to telehealth, being able to do video visits or zoom calls,” Dr. Nagata said. “That allows you to be a provider anywhere in California. We have a lot of patients in the Bay Area who if they’re not able to find a local provider, there may be a provider in Southern California.”
Telehealth also eliminates any transportation time barrier that may limit access to care, which can be a problem for those that live in rural areas and have a shortage of providers.
While video counseling does alleviate some of the issue, demand still far exceeds the supply of mental health therapists.
“Telehealth still hasn’t been enough,” Dr. Nagata said. “We still have a lot of patients that have reported month long wait lists to get into therapy.”
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