Sylvie Bernaerts

• PhD in Biomedical Sciences
• Researcher at Thomas More University of Applied Sciences

Digital mental health solutions have great potential to enhance mental healthcare. However, barriers at the level of users, interventions and context hinder engagement and uptake. Involving users in the design, adaptation and implementation process has been put forward as a potential solution, yet instructions and examples on how to do so are limit...

Increased user participation in developing and adapting digital mental health solutions helps to tackle barriers and enhance facilitators for uptake of and engagement with digital mental health solutions. These guideline aims to aid this process of involving and empowering the intended users and provide a practical step-by-step guide to better und...

Background Accumulating evidence supports the use of virtual reality (VR) in mental health care, with one potential application being its use to assist individuals with relaxation exercises. Despite studies finding support for the potential of VR to effectively aid in relaxation, its implementation remains limited outside of specialized clinics. Kn...

BACKGROUND Accumulating evidence supports the use of virtual reality (VR) in mental health care, with one potential application being its use to assist individuals with relaxation exercises. Despite studies finding support for the potential of VR to effectively aid in relaxation, its implementation remains limited outside of specialized clinics. Kn...

Prior neuroimaging clinical trials investigating the neural effects of intranasal administration of the neuropeptide oxytocin demonstrated a key role of the amygdala in oxytocin’s neuromodulatory effects. These studies mostly demonstrated the acute effects of single-dose administrations, examining task-dependent effects of oxytocin on brain activit...

Introduction While online consultations have shown promise to be a means for the effective delivery of high-quality mental healthcare and the first implementations of these digital therapeutic contacts go back nearly two decades, uptake has remained limited over the years. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic dramatically altered this relative stands...

Accumulating evidence supports the use of virtual reality (VR) as an effective pain and anxiety management tool for pediatric patients during specific medical procedures in dedicated patient groups. However, VR is still not widely adopted in everyday clinical practice. Feasibility and acceptability measures of clinicians' experiences are often miss...

Background: Living labs in the health and well-being domain have become increasingly common over the past decade but vary in available infrastructure, implemented study designs, and outcome measures. The Horizon 2020 Project Virtual Health and Wellbeing Living Lab Infrastructure aims to harmonize living lab procedures and open living lab infrastruc...

Background: Living Labs are user-centered, open innovation ecosystems based on a systematic user cocreation approach, which integrates research and innovation processes in real-life communities and settings. The Horizon 2020 Project VITALISE (Virtual Health and Wellbeing Living Lab Infrastructure) unites 19 partners across 11 countries. The projec...

BACKGROUND Living labs are user-centred, open innovation ecosystems based on systematic user co-creation approach, integrating research and innovation processes in real life communities and settings. The Horizon 2020 project “Virtual Health and Wellbeing Living Lab Infrastructure” (VITALISE) unites 19 partners across 11 countries. The project aims...

BACKGROUND Living labs in the health and wellbeing domain have become increasingly common over the past decade but vary in available infrastructure, implemented study designs and outcome measures. Increased transnational collaboration and harmonization can further improve research quality. The Horizon 2020 Project ‘Virtual Health and Wellbeing Livi...

Introduction While the general uptake of e-mental health interventions remained low over the past years, physical distancing and lockdown measures relating to the COVID-19 pandemic created a need and demand for online consultations in only a matter of weeks. Objective This study investigates the uptake of online consultations provided by mental he...

E-mental health, or the use of technology in mental healthcare, has been the focus of research for over two decades. Over that period, the evidence-base for the potential of technology to improve psychotherapeutic practice has grown steadily. This sharply contrasts with the actual use of e-mental health by psychotherapists, which has remained limit...

BACKGROUND While the general uptake of e-mental health interventions remained low over the past years, physical distancing and quarantine measures relating to the COVID-19 pandemic created a need and demand for online consultations and telepsychology in only a matter of weeks. OBJECTIVE This study investigates the uptake of online consultations pr...

This paper is now published in Internet Interventions: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.invent.2021.100405

Intranasal administration of the neuropeptide oxytocin (OT) is increasingly explored as a potential treatment for targeting the core symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Previously, interactions of exogenously administered OT with its endogenous production have been demonstrated following single-dose administrations. However, the impact of r...

Intranasal administration of the neuropeptide oxytocin (IN-OT) is increasingly considered as a potential treatment for targeting the core symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), but the effects of continual use on neural substrates are fairly unexplored and long-term effects are unknown. In this double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled stud...

Recomendaciones para pólizas y prácticas de telepsicoterapia y e-mental health en Europa y más allá La pandemia de COVID-19 ha traído consigo una gran necesidad de utilizar telepsicoterapia y otras intervenciones utilizando teorías y técnicas psicológicas para apoyar la salud mental y física. E-mental health presenta una amplia gama de oportunidade...

Intranasal administration of the neuropeptide oxytocin (IN-OT) is increasingly explored as a potential treatment for targeting the core symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). To date, however, the impact of multiple-dose IN-OT treatment on human neural circuitry is largely unknown, and also the possibility that long-term IN-OT use may induce l...

Background: Intranasal administration of the "prosocial" neuropeptide oxytocin is increasingly explored as a potential treatment for targeting the core characteristics of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, long-term follow-up studies, evaluating the possibility of long-lasting retention effects, are currently lacking. Methods: Using a doub...

Background Intranasal administration of the prosocial neuropeptide oxytocin is increasingly explored as a potential treatment for targeting the core characteristics of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, long-term follow-up studies, evaluating the possibility of long-lasting retention effects are currently lacking. Methods Using a double-blind...

Background: Oxytocin (OT) plays a pivotal role in interpersonal bonding, affiliation, and trust, and its intranasal administration is increasingly considered as a potential treatment for autism spectrum disorder. Methods: We explored whether variations in endogenous salivary OT concentration are related to interindividual differences in core aut...

Background: Autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) are characterized by impairments in social communication and interaction and repetitive and restricted behaviors. To date, no pharmacological treatment exists targeting the core symptoms of ASD, yet the past years, the pharmacological use of a neuropeptide, called oxytocin (OT), has gained increasing int...

The second iteration of the Autism Brain Imaging Data Exchange (ABIDE II) aims to enhance the scope of brain connectomics research in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Consistent with the initial ABIDE effort (ABIDE I), that released 1112 datasets in 2012, this new multisite open-data resource is an aggregate of resting state functional magnetic reso...

The neuropeptide ‘oxytocin’ (OT) is known to play a pivotal role in a variety of complex social behaviors by promoting a prosocial attitude and interpersonal bonding. Previous studies showed that a single-dose of exogenously administered OT can affect trust and feelings of attachment insecurity. With the present study, we explored the effects of tw...

Direct eye contact is a powerful social cue to regulate interpersonal interactions. Previous behavioral studies showed a link between eye contact and motor mimicry, indicating that the automatic mimicry of observed hand movements is significantly enhanced when direct eye contact exists between the observer and the observed model. In the present stu...

The neuropeptide ‘oxytocin’ (OT) is known to play a pivotal role in a variety of complex social behaviors by promoting a prosocial attitude and interpersonal bonding. One mechanism by which OT is hypothesized to promote prosocial behavior is by enhancing the processing of socially relevant information from the environment. With the present study, w...

INFLUENCE OF OXYTOCIN ON EMOTION RECOGNITION: A RANDOMIZED PLACEBO-CONTROLLED TRIAL Sylvie Bernaerts, Emmely Berra, Kaat Alaerts KU Leuven The neuropeptide ‘oxytocin’ (OT) is known to play a pivotal role in a variety of complex social behaviors. It is hypothesized that OT promotes prosocial behavior by enhancing the processing of socially-relevant...

P03 De effecten van oxytocine op de herkenning van lichaamstaal met een emotionele geladenheid Claudia Dillen, Sylvie Bernaerts, Emmely Berra, Guy Bosmans, Jean Steyaert, Kaat Alaerts Onderzoek bij mensen en dieren heeft aangetoond dat oxytocine (OT) een belangrijke rol speelt bij sociaal gedrag. Het wordt gelinkt aan o.a. vertrouwen en hechting. D...