Animation depicts the experience of remote healthcare for eating disorders

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many healthcare services were transitioned to run remotely - for example via video calls - creating challenges, particularly for those with eating disorders or eating distress.

Dr Dawn Branley-Bell, Associate Professor of Cyberpsychology and Director of the Psychology and Communication Technology Lab (PaCT Lab) at Northumbria University, is leading a three-year research programme titled, Remote Healthcare for Eating Disorders throughout COVID-19 (RHED–C) - funded by the Medical Research Foundation.

View the animation in full on Vimeo.

The RHED-C project explores the benefits and challenges of receiving and/or providing online healthcare for eating disorders and eating distress and identifies future support recommendations.

Workshops and animation

As part of the wider RHED-C project, Dr Branley-Bell has collaborated with Northumbria University colleagues Claire Murphy-Morgan (Senior Research Assistant, PaCT Lab) and Dr Henry Collingham (Innovation Fellow, Centre for Digital Citizens) to create an animation exploring the benefits and challenges of receiving and/or providing online healthcare for eating disorders and eating distress and identifying future support recommendations.

The team collaborated with a local charity, Eating Distress North East (EDNE), and people who have experienced remote support for eating disorders. People with lived experience were invited to creative workshops which were delivered by the RHED-C team, and local artist, Helen Shaddock, who has also experienced eating distress.

Participants were encouraged to use methods such as painting to share their experiences during the pandemic. These workshops were then translated into an animation - artwork and discussions formed the visuals and script, and voiceovers were given by the workshop participants.

The animation raises awareness of the benefits and challenges of remote support for eating distress throughout the pandemic and was produced to help health service providers understand individual experiences and improve remote patient care. It also was intended to reduce the associated stigma, which is known to prevent people from seeking the support they need.

Outcomes

The outcome of the workshops highlighted an obvious benefit of remote healthcare - the convenience of accessing support from home. But they also unveiled challenges which have been relatively overlooked. Poor internet connection made for disjointed sessions and patients often dealt with feelings of anxiety triggered by seeing themselves on camera during a video call.

Working with people who have first-hand experience of both receiving and providing online support, the workshops have enabled Northumbria researchers to identify what the future of remote support might look like and to co-design tools and interventions to promote more effective and accessible support.

Later this year, the team hopes to share a free online toolkit aimed at healthcare providers, as well as people looking for online support including carers and families. It will provide advice and resources designed to improve the online support experience.

Dr Branley-Bell said: “The RHED-C project is critical in understanding the experiences of people with eating disorders and most importantly, learning from these experiences to improve future support. Remote support for eating disorders has the potential to provide inclusive, effective, and supportive care, and through RHED-C, we aim to develop practical solutions to promote this.”

Anne Fry, Chief Executive at Eating Distress North East, said: “Working with the RHED-C team has been a valuable experience in ensuring the voices of people living with eating distress are listened to. The research team worked hard to include people and make it possible for them to contribute, using creative and engaging methods. The experiences highlighted through this work can help us all reflect on our practice and work to make accessing services for eating distress easier for everyone.”

A world premiere of the animation, and an accompanying short documentary about how it was made, took place at the Computer Human Interaction (CHI) conference in Honolulu, Hawaii last month, where it was named one of the Top 3 Best Films.

Find out more about the RHED-C programme and the research findings published by Frontiers in Psychiatry.