A research on the effects of the lockdown on the mental health of the population during the pandemic showed that among the 20 thousand respondents, as many as 2,555 (about 12%) reported severe or extremely severe levels of depressive symptoms. Not only that: 3,627 respondents (17%) complained of anxiety symptoms, and finally 8619 (41.6%) reported feeling at least stressed. The women interviewed, along with obviously people with previous mental health problems, showed an increased risk of developing severe depression and anxiety symptoms. The measures to contain mobility and sociability, therefore, although necessary for the control of infections, have significantly influenced not only the normal sense of well-being of the population, but also their degree of mental health.
The experience lived by the population in the local context of Ulss 3 Serenissima does not differ from the problems that the pandemic has produced in other regional, national and international areas. And in the face of this situation, the work of the Department of Mental Health has been very intense: “During 2020 – underlines the director, Moreno De Rossi – a total of 33 thousand interviews were held and 7,171 people were helped at our Mental Health Centers. Also in 2020, 3,438 people turned for the first time to the mental health services of our Ulss, since it reconfirms the centrality of these services as a reference for the population that manifests mental discomfort “.
And even in times of pandemics the Department of Mental Health has carried out directly at home 6,488 interventionsthe. «Most of these interventions – underlines the head physician – were directly or indirectly related to the psychological problems raised or exacerbated by the pandemic. Isolation, uncertainties about the progression of the pandemic, ‘hypochondriacal concerns’ and the fear that the epidemic was difficult to control have been triggers for the development of mental health problems. To confirm the incisiveness of the overall system of care on the territory, there is also the figure of the decline in hospital admissions in the four psychiatry wards of the Ulss 3: “Between March and December, the months marked by Covid, hospital admissions fell of around 10 per cent – explains De Rossi – compared to the equivalent period of the previous year. Compared to 2019, however, the mandatory health treatments were unchanged, which over the last year throughout the Ulss 3 involved 63 patients out of a total of 9789 assisted, reaching the lowest levels in Italy “.
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