Observational Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Psychiatry. Feb 19, 2023; 13(2): 60-74
Published online Feb 19, 2023. doi: 10.5498/wjp.v13.i2.60
Development of a protocol for videoconferencing-based exposure and response prevention treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder during the COVID-19 pandemic
Sanjana Kathiravan, Subho Chakrabarti
Sanjana Kathiravan, Subho Chakrabarti, Department of Psychiatry, Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh 160012, India
Author contributions: Kathiravan S and Chakrabarti S were involved in preparing the study protocol and conducting the review of the literature; Kathiravan S collected the data about patient treatment; Kathiravan S and Chakrabarti S were both involved in analyzing the data and preparing the manuscript; All authors have approved the final version of the manuscript for submission.
Institutional review board statement: This observational study was a part of a larger study on home-based TMH services for all patients[37]. The protocol was approved by the institute’s ethics committee. Due to the restrictions imposed by the pandemic, verbal informed consent over the phone was allowed. Copies of the approval from the ethics committee have been uploaded.
Informed consent statement: This observational study was a part of a larger study on home-based TMH services for all patients[37]. The protocol was approved by the institute’s ethics committee. Due to the restrictions imposed by the pandemic, verbal informed consent over the phone was allowed. As explained above, data regarding outcomes were obtained only from patients who had verbally consented to undertake exposure and response prevention and had actively engaged in the process of treatment. However, patients were not contacted or assessed separately to determine these outcomes. Rather, all data regarding outcomes were extracted from routine medical and treatment records. Patient identities have not been revealed. Therefore, written informed consent from patients was not obtained for information about treatment outcomes. All the methods followed the guidelines of the Declaration of Helsinki for medical research involving human subjects.
Conflict-of-interest statement: None of the authors have any potential conflicts of interest to report. Details have been provided in the conflict-of-interest statement format.
Data sharing statement: Data regarding the study are available from the corresponding author (subhochd@yahoo.com) upon reasonable request.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement—checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement—checklist of items. The checklist has been included.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Subho Chakrabarti, MD, Professor, Department of Psychiatry, Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Sector 12, Chandigarh 160012, India. subhochd@yahoo.com
Received: August 14, 2022
Peer-review started: August 14, 2022
First decision: October 21, 2022
Revised: November 1, 2022
Accepted: December 6, 2022
Article in press: December 6, 2022
Published online: February 19, 2023
Processing time: 186 Days and 18.3 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: The coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic adversely impacted many patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), compelling clinicians to increasingly use telemental health-based options rather than conventional psychotherapeutic treatments for OCD. This study described the implementation of a videoconferencing-based exposure and response prevention treatment protocol developed by an online group of clinicians during the pandemic. On prospective follow-up, 34 patients had either completed or were undergoing the treatment. The preliminary results showed that videoconferencing-based exposure and response prevention was a feasible and efficacious mode of treatment and may be a useful option for OCD, even in low-resource settings.