Teletherapy: its pros and cons

There has recently become a great interest in psychotherapy after increasing awareness of mental health and its importance for those who want to live a healthy and fruitful life to the fullest. Your mental health is a guide to feeling happy and achieving success. Success is not only success in working life but also success in various relationships such as marriage, friendship, relationships with your children and other individuals in your private and public life. It is a guide to coming to terms with the past and reaching a better future. A guide to recovering from trauma and experiences of failures or obstacles.

You will find that taking care of your mental health reflects on your physical health as well. It enhances the quality of your sleep and avoids many bad habits that you resort to to get rid of stress, sadness and anxiety such as smoking, addiction in all its forms, excessive or abstinence from eating. Better mental health means better productivity, healthy relationships, getting rid of depression and mental illness and also preventing them by addressing mental illnesses.

Features of teletherapy:

Access psychotherapy services wherever you are: If you are in a remote area or an area where psychotherapy services are not available and it is difficult for you to travel or move, telemedicine gives you the same services without the need to travel or move.

Treatment for all: If you have physical challenges or disabilities, it is very difficult to reach the treatment places and therefore, telemedicine provides you with the same service from your home, it is enough to be connected to the Internet.

Time management: Teletherapy provides you with the advantage of time management. You can choose the optimal day and time for your busy life program. You can also get sessions outside the official opening hours of clinics as some platforms provide 24-hour psychiatric services.

Privacy: Teletherapy helps you gain privacy, as you can receive sessions in your own room inside your home. This will help you get rid of the stress of societal stigma and choose to share the truth of your psychotherapy with only those you trust or those close to you, or even keep the information only for yourself, which is your most basic right.

Cost: Teletherapy sessions are less expensive than clinic sessions, many platforms offer a lower cost for their sessions and therefore, you can get rid of the margin of the cost burden of sessions.

Other services: Psychotherapy provides some additional services such as questions and responses to them. In the case of treatment with regular sessions, you are not allowed to refer to the doctor except on the official dates of your pre-scheduled sessions, but in teletherapy, you can send questions or inquiries and respond to them without the need to wait for the session date. All are reasons why telepsychiatry has become a better option for some people.

Disadvantages of telepsychotherapy

Technological challenges: If you have difficulty accessing the Internet or the quality of the Internet is poor where you are, it is difficult for you to practice teletherapy. Also, if you suffer from difficulty using the computer, mobile devices or various Internet programs, you will find it impossible without the help of another, which takes away the element of privacy of the sessions.

Therapist difficulties: Part of the therapist's diagnosis of your condition and being able to help you is to monitor your body language during your speech and various emotions that reflect on your body. For example, if you get irritable while talking about a particular person or topic, you may be able to control your facial emotions, but you will make nervous movements such as shaking your legs with nervous movements or sweating your palms. In the case of telemedicine, the doctor cannot monitor all your movements and emotions with the same quality as psychiatric clinic sessions, as it is easy for the doctor to see your movements and emotions in full.

Safety: When you go to well-known and licensed psychotherapy clinics, you can easily be sure that the clinic is legal and qualified to practice psychotherapy sessions. In the case of remote treatment, whether through doctors or platforms, it is difficult to verify the doctor's personality, the qualifications of the place, the extent of its legality and its commitment to the code of professional ethics, we advise you to be accurate and careful when practicing remote psychotherapy and to ensure the reputation of the platform and the qualifications of the therapist, as some practice psychotherapy without obtaining the appropriate qualifications.

Finally, if you suffer from stress, depression or excessive sadness that makes it difficult for you to lead a normal life, we recommend that you seek a specialist and undergo psychotherapy sessions. Your life is a trust and we hope you live it better. And do not accept any pressure from others or stigmatization of my society because it is your life, I own it now and do not hesitate.