Attending to the Mental Health of People Who Are Homeless by Mobile Telephone Follow-Up: A Systematic Review

Cristina Jiménez-Lérida; Carmen Herrera-Espiñeira; Reina Granados; Adelina Martín-Salvador

doi:10.3390/healthcare11121666

Attending to the Mental Health of People Who Are Homeless by Mobile Telephone Follow-Up: A Systematic Review

Healthcare (Basel). 2023 Jun 6;11(12):1666. doi: 10.3390/healthcare11121666.

Authors

Cristina Jiménez-Lérida¹, Carmen Herrera-Espiñeira^{2

3}, Reina Granados², Adelina Martín-Salvador²

Affiliations

¹ Contrato Garantía Juvenil, University of Granada, 18071 Granada, Spain.
² PhD Department of Nursing, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Granada, 18071 Granada, Spain.
³ Instituto de Investigación Biosanitaria de Granada (Ibs. Granada), 18012 Granada, Spain.

Abstract

Background: More than 20% of the world's population has no decent or suitable home. People who are homeless have more health problems than the rest of the population, especially mental health-type problems. The main objective of this study was to identify follow-up interventions by using mobile telephones to improve the mental health of people who are homeless and to analyze their efficiency.

Methods: To do so, a systematic review was carried out in the Web of Science, PubMed, Scopus, Ebscohost, and PsyInfo databases.

Results: Studies conclude that mobile phone use is a suitable means to improve adherence to medication and the mental health of the homeless. However, significant attempts to demonstrate health benefits by means of reliable and valid instruments that supplement qualitative satisfaction and feedback instruments appear to be lacking.

Conclusions: The literature about mental health benefits through technology for people who are homeless is scarce and shows methodological limitations that can lead to failure when setting up methodologies in clinical practice.

Keywords: intervention; mental health; people who are homeless; smartphone.

Publication types

Review

Grants and funding

The publication of this manuscript has been financed thanks to the Prize for a Research Project in the 40th Edition of the “Certamen de Enfermería San Juan de Dios” and the 4th Prize for Oral Communication in the “III Jornada Internacional de Innovación y Desarrollo en Cuidados”.