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The Feasibility and Impact of Practising Online Forest Bathing to Improve Anxiety, Rumination, Social Connection and Long-COVID Symptoms: A Pilot Study

Background: Long-COVID affects over 144 million people globally. In the absence of treatments, there is a need to establish the efficacy of therapies that improve patient outcomes. Forest bathing has been demonstrated to improve physical and mental outcomes but there is no evidence in Long-COVID pat...

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Autores principales: McEwan, Kirsten, Collett, Harriet, Nairn, Jean, Bird, Jamie, Faghy, Mark A., Pfeifer, Eric, Jackson, Jessica E., Cook, Caroline, Bond, Amanda
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9691063/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36429623
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192214905
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author McEwan, Kirsten
Collett, Harriet
Nairn, Jean
Bird, Jamie
Faghy, Mark A.
Pfeifer, Eric
Jackson, Jessica E.
Cook, Caroline
Bond, Amanda
author_facet McEwan, Kirsten
Collett, Harriet
Nairn, Jean
Bird, Jamie
Faghy, Mark A.
Pfeifer, Eric
Jackson, Jessica E.
Cook, Caroline
Bond, Amanda
author_sort McEwan, Kirsten
collection PubMed
description Background: Long-COVID affects over 144 million people globally. In the absence of treatments, there is a need to establish the efficacy of therapies that improve patient outcomes. Forest bathing has been demonstrated to improve physical and mental outcomes but there is no evidence in Long-COVID patients. Accordingly, this pilot study sought to determine the feasibility and effectiveness of online forest bathing in adults with Long-COVID. Methods: Feasibility was assessed by monitoring retention rates and participant feedback. In a waitlist controlled, repeated measures design, 22 Long-COVID patients completed weekly online surveys during a four-week waitlist control period, before engaging in four weekly online forest bathing sessions, completing post-intervention surveys following each session. Results: In terms of retention, 27% did not provide post-intervention data, reasons for non-adherence were: feeling too ill, having medical appointments, or having career responsibilities. Compared with the waitlist control period, there were statistically significant improvements in Anxiety (49% decrease), Rumination (48% decrease), Social Connection (78% increase), and Long-COVID symptoms (22% decrease). Written qualitative comments indicated that participants experienced feelings of calm and joy, felt more connected socially and with nature, and experienced a break from the pain and rumination surrounding their illness. Conclusions: Online Forest bathing resulted in significant improvements in well-being and symptom severity and could be considered an accessible and inexpensive adjunct therapy for Long-COVID patients. Where people have limited access to in-person nature, virtual nature may offer an alternative to improve health and well-being outcomes.
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spelling pubmed-96910632022-11-25 The Feasibility and Impact of Practising Online Forest Bathing to Improve Anxiety, Rumination, Social Connection and Long-COVID Symptoms: A Pilot Study McEwan, Kirsten Collett, Harriet Nairn, Jean Bird, Jamie Faghy, Mark A. Pfeifer, Eric Jackson, Jessica E. Cook, Caroline Bond, Amanda Int J Environ Res Public Health Article Background: Long-COVID affects over 144 million people globally. In the absence of treatments, there is a need to establish the efficacy of therapies that improve patient outcomes. Forest bathing has been demonstrated to improve physical and mental outcomes but there is no evidence in Long-COVID patients. Accordingly, this pilot study sought to determine the feasibility and effectiveness of online forest bathing in adults with Long-COVID. Methods: Feasibility was assessed by monitoring retention rates and participant feedback. In a waitlist controlled, repeated measures design, 22 Long-COVID patients completed weekly online surveys during a four-week waitlist control period, before engaging in four weekly online forest bathing sessions, completing post-intervention surveys following each session. Results: In terms of retention, 27% did not provide post-intervention data, reasons for non-adherence were: feeling too ill, having medical appointments, or having career responsibilities. Compared with the waitlist control period, there were statistically significant improvements in Anxiety (49% decrease), Rumination (48% decrease), Social Connection (78% increase), and Long-COVID symptoms (22% decrease). Written qualitative comments indicated that participants experienced feelings of calm and joy, felt more connected socially and with nature, and experienced a break from the pain and rumination surrounding their illness. Conclusions: Online Forest bathing resulted in significant improvements in well-being and symptom severity and could be considered an accessible and inexpensive adjunct therapy for Long-COVID patients. Where people have limited access to in-person nature, virtual nature may offer an alternative to improve health and well-being outcomes. MDPI 2022-11-12 /pmc/articles/PMC9691063/ /pubmed/36429623 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192214905 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
McEwan, Kirsten
Collett, Harriet
Nairn, Jean
Bird, Jamie
Faghy, Mark A.
Pfeifer, Eric
Jackson, Jessica E.
Cook, Caroline
Bond, Amanda
The Feasibility and Impact of Practising Online Forest Bathing to Improve Anxiety, Rumination, Social Connection and Long-COVID Symptoms: A Pilot Study
title The Feasibility and Impact of Practising Online Forest Bathing to Improve Anxiety, Rumination, Social Connection and Long-COVID Symptoms: A Pilot Study
title_full The Feasibility and Impact of Practising Online Forest Bathing to Improve Anxiety, Rumination, Social Connection and Long-COVID Symptoms: A Pilot Study
title_fullStr The Feasibility and Impact of Practising Online Forest Bathing to Improve Anxiety, Rumination, Social Connection and Long-COVID Symptoms: A Pilot Study
title_full_unstemmed The Feasibility and Impact of Practising Online Forest Bathing to Improve Anxiety, Rumination, Social Connection and Long-COVID Symptoms: A Pilot Study
title_short The Feasibility and Impact of Practising Online Forest Bathing to Improve Anxiety, Rumination, Social Connection and Long-COVID Symptoms: A Pilot Study
title_sort feasibility and impact of practising online forest bathing to improve anxiety, rumination, social connection and long-covid symptoms: a pilot study
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9691063/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36429623
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192214905
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