Saturday February 27, 2021 | VICTORIA, BC
by Mary P Brooke, B.Sc, editor | Island Social Trends
The BC Children’s Hospital has launched an online survey about the emotional and life-impacts of COVID-19, inviting both parents/caregivers and children to participate, as well as adults who have no dependents.
The survey was first launched February 8 and will run through to December 31, 2021. Participants may contribute on a monthly basis as conditions of the ongoing pandemic continue to change.
The Personal Impacts of COVID-19 (PICS) Survey wants to hear directly from children older than 7 years old whose parents consent to this.
UBC and SFU are also part of organizing the study which focuses on the emotional and mental health aspects of how people are dealing with the ongoing pandemic.
Reason for the survey:
“The impacts of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic may be widespread, extending beyond physical health aspects for youth, their parents and other adults,” it is stated in the survey intro.
Study co-leads Dr. S. Evelyn Stewart, director of psychiatry research at BC Children’s, and Dr. Hasina Samji, an affiliate investigator with BC Children’s and assistant professor with SFU’s faculty of health sciences, want to gauge how the pandemic affects people’s feelings, thoughts and actions over time, to learn how they manage and what resources they find helpful.
“With an emphasis on the infection and mortality rates of COVID-19, its effects on individuals’ thoughts, feelings and actions may be overlooked. Identifying the most effective resources and coping strategies is important for future individual and population-level interventions.”
Seeking person-centered outcomes:
To better understand how the pandemic has impacted individuals, this survey aims to capture longitudinal person-centred outcomes with respect to feelings, thoughts and actions, in addition to learning resources and coping techniques over a one-year period.
This survey is not intended to replace a clinician’s mental health assessment, it cannot replace diagnosis by a professional, and that individual responses will not be reviewed by a clinician.
Participants will be asked some questions about demography; awareness about COVID-19; restrictions due to COVID-19; general, social, and emotion impacts due to COVID-19; impacts on worries, actions, and daily activities due to COVID-19; and medical conditions. It takes approximately 20-30 minutes to complete the survey.
Other spinoffs:
The results from this study can help better understand how an outbreak impacts people so better resources can be developed to help them cope. To learn about the results of this study, group survey results will be available by emailing evelyn.stewart@ubc.ca after analyses are complete.
How to participate:
To share your feedback in the Personal Impacts of COVID-19 survey, visit: https://www.bcchr.ca/POP/our-research/pics
Questions and/or concerns about the survey, please do not hesitate to contact the research coordinator, Zainab Naqqash, at PICS@bcchr.ca
Privacy:
Study organizers say that only the study team and the technical support team at BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute will access your information. The study team will run the survey and analyze the results
Survey data will be stored in PHSA’s BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute’s Secured Network electronically for 5 years.
