About This Project
The Covid-19 pandemic has serious health implications for older adults. In addition to the risks of the disease itself, self-isolation limiting social contact with family and friends may have psychosocial impacts, such as reduced quality of life and loneliness, leading to depression and anxiety which can be substantial and long lasting. The impact of Covid-19, and the strategies implemented by the government and health care, vary considerably in the UK, US, and Australia. This multidisciplinary team will study and compare the psychological impacts, including quality of life, mental health, coping strategies, loneliness, resilience and cognition, of Covid19-related social isolation in elderly people across the three countries. In addition, we will perform a pilot feasibility-controlled trial to evaluate the use of a novel online psychological intervention focusing on resilience to improve wellbeing. The current project will capitalize on the active large UK PROTECT cohort as well as cohorts from ASU and UNSW, which allows a rapid and cost-efficient study. Understanding the psychosocial effects, and the feasibility and preliminary efficacy data from the intervention will put us in a very strong position to successfully apply for a larger grant to perform a large randomized controlled trial in the three countries.