Telepsychology and the COVID-19 pandemic: the experiences of psychologists in South Africa

The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic has drawn renewed attention to telepsychology. This study reports on the experiences of psychologists in response to the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic pertaining to the provision, application, and accessibility of telepsychology services in the South African context. The findings highlight the direct and indirect implications of the pandemic and its impact on both practitioners and clients. The core themes comprise an increase in mental health care needs, challenges pertaining to therapeutic modalities in response to crises, as well as contextual considerations. The latter include barriers to telepsychology, such as the costs of data, as well as limitations to confidentiality and privacy.

The feasibility of prolonged exposure therapy for PTSD in low- and middle-income countries: a review

There is a need in the global south to evaluate and implement empirically supported psychological interventions to ameliorate symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Empirically supported treatments (ESTs) have increasingly been developed and implemented, yet the majority people in the global south do not have access to these treatments for mental disorders such as PTSD. Prolonged exposure therapy has accrued substantial empirical evidence to show it as an effective treatment for PTSD. Research on the effectiveness and acceptability of prolonged exposure in a low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are sparse. This brief report presents a review of prolonged exposure (PE) therapy and its feasibility as a trauma therapy for PTSD in LMICs. First, we present a brief overview of PE as a first-line treatment for PTSD. Second, using South Africa as a case example, we present a brief overview of traumatic stress in South Africa and how mental healthcare has developed since the abolishment of apartheid in 1994. Lastly, we discuss the challenges pertaining to the dissemination and implementation of PE in LMICs and propose future perspectives regarding the implementation of ESTs such as PE in LMICs.

A case study of lessons learnt from implementing a routine outcome monitoring system for psychotherapy in a South African community clinic

Monitoring outcomes in psychotherapy is important for advancing research into empirically supported treatments, collecting data to inform practice-based evidence and for monitoring patient treatment responses during routine care. We implemented two routine outcome monitoring measures in a community psychology clinic in South Africa, namely, the Outcome Rating Scale and Kessler Psychological Distress Scale. In this article, we adopt a case study methodology to describe and critically reflect on the implementation process and evaluate the utility of the outcome data collected during the first year of implementation. Our findings suggest that the measures have some utility but that there were significant problems with implementation. We found that Outcome Rating Scale and Kessler Psychological Distress Scale scores correlated in the expected direction; however, Outcome Rating Scale intake scores for the present population were at odds with the measure’s norms. The findings highlight the care that needs to be taken to change routine clinical practice when outcome measures are implemented in local settings and the need for research to validate the use of these ROM measures in South African clinical settings.

Psychologists’ endorsement of empirically unsupported statements in psychology: Noch Einmal

In this study, 103 South African psychologists were asked to rate the extent to which they believed a set of empirically incorrect statements were true or untrue. Of the 50 statements, 14 (28%) received a moderate level of endorsement as being factually correct and 8 (16%) received a high level of endorsement as being factually correct. Significant differences in the percentages of items endorsed were found between master’s- and doctoral-level psychologists for five statements. Significant differences in the percentages of items endorsed between clinical and counselling psychologists were found for three statements. These findings are explained by noting that there is no consensus among psychologists about whether psychology is a strictly scientific discipline and whether it gives rise to scientific facts about human behaviour. Relatedly, it is possible that South African psychology curricula are not sufficiently focused on the empirical and scientific evidence that informs psychological knowledge. Also, psychology as taught in undergraduate programmes is characterised by a diversity of theory. Consequently, no consensus on theoretical understandings of human behaviour appears to be in sight. Finally, popular and folk understandings of psychology overlap to some extent with empirical psychology, but what makes intuitive sense may not be empirically accurate. Some suggestions are offered for the curricula psychology of departments at South African universities.