Psychological Testing and Treatment

To this proposal, the 3 medical businesses described above apply: Online EMR, Telemedicine, Marketing and Marketplaces.

Psychology is a discipline that can greatly benefit from the Internet, because there is no strict need for physical contact between patient and doctor. Of course, something is lost when human proximity is replaced by a webcam. There are a number of clues from the environment, body language and details that help the psychologist to make a diagnosis. But psychological tests are objective and can be easily implemented and carried out online. The advantage of offering Web Psycho Testing is to centralize the tests, to assure uniformity, and to be able to chain the tests according to the results and following a predetermined algorithm, thus automating most of the diagnostic process.

Some tests were made as downloadable software, intended to be executed in the desktop PC of the acting psychologist, and others run in the server and can be solved online. The latter are less prone to manipulation and can be better controlled.

Children tests can take the form of games, for better acceptance. Some can be used to test the game addiction phenomenon, something that poses a problem on itself, and also can bring light in other, more serious addictions. There is a whole article on games as psy tests in this site, based on the idea that any game can be used as a test, and that the playing information of any user can be used by a psychologist.

Regarding therapy online, the psychoanalytic method is very suitable for online therapy, allowing one doctor to analyze the written thoughts of patients in a fraction of the time it takes to meet them and listen to them. Both email, messaging and forums can be used for this word exchange.

It is true that personal contact has a lot of information useful for the therapists, and that spoken language has peculiar mistakes (lapsus linguae) that are paramount for the Freudian psychoanalysis. However, the theory will need to evolve to cover the new ways of communication.

The quite rigid methodology and psychoanalytic mindset make online therapy migration a slow process. But my feeling is that almost all psy diagnosis and therapy will be online in 5-6 years. Argentina is the largest supplier of Freudian and Lacanian psychoanalysts in the world, so the conditions for starting this business here are optimal.