JMIR pediatrics and parenting
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JMIR Pediatr Parent · Jul 2020
Pediatric Mental and Behavioral Health in the Period of Quarantine and Social Distancing With COVID-19.
The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has spread rapidly throughout the world and has had a long-term impact. The pandemic has caused great harm to society and caused serious psychological trauma to many people. Children are a vulnerable group in this global public health emergency, as their nervous systems, endocrine systems, and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axes are not well developed. ⋯ Digital approaches, health technologies, and informatics are supposed to be designed and implemented to support public health surveillance and critical responses to children's growth and development. For instance, human-computer interactions, augmented reality, and virtual reality could be incorporated to remote psychological supporting service for children's health; mobile technologies could be used to monitor children's mental and behavioral health while protecting their individual privacy; big data and artificial intelligence could be used to support decision making on whether children should go out for physical activities and whether schools should be reopened. Implications to clinical practices, psychological therapeutic practices, and future research directions to address current effort gaps are highlighted in this study.