Digital Phenotyping of Anxiety-Depression Comorbidity in Tele-Mental Health: Severity Coupling and…

Cohort studyMedical sciences (Basel, Switzerland)· Jul 2026

Digital Phenotyping of Anxiety-Depression Comorbidity in Tele-Mental Health: Severity Coupling and Resource-Use Signatures in a Real-World Cohort.

Anastácia Zoriy, Ana Dionísio, Filipe Pinto, Nuno Vale

Mood DisordersCohort studyClinical practiceQ1IF 6.0

Nearly half of tele-mental health patients had both anxiety and depression

Digital Phenotyping of Anxiety-Depression Comorbidity in Tele-Mental Health: Severity Coupling and Resource-Use Signatures in a Real-World Cohort.

Anastácia Zoriy … Nuno Vale

Medical sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · Jul 2026 · Q1 in General Medicine

Background

Anxiety and depression are major contributors to mental-health burden and frequently co-occur in clinical practice.

Purpose

This study aimed to characterize anxiety-depression comorbidity in a large real-world tele-mental health cohort and to determine whether symptom severity was associated with distinct patterns of healthcare utilization.

Methods

We conducted a retrospective real-world study of 3467 patients followed in psychiatry and psychology teleconsultations.

n = 3467 patients

Results

nearly half of online mental-health care patients had both anxiety and depression together

61.7%

Anxiety and/or depress

43.8%

Comorbid anxiety-depre

More results

Within comorbid cases, anxiety and depression severity were strongly coupled, with depression severity varying systematically across anxiety severity strata (chi-square p = 9.88 × 10 -102 ).

More results

Compared with isolated anxiety or depression, comorbidity was associated with a more intensive healthcare-utilization profile, characterized by a higher mean number of consultations and shorter inter-visit intervals.

Among comorbid patients, females showed greater longitudinal service use than males, with more visits and closer follow-up.

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Conclusion · 1 of 2

In this large real-world tele-mental health cohort, anxiety-depression comorbidity was highly prevalent, clinically structured, and associated with distinct and measurable resource-use signatures.

Conclusion · 2 of 2

These findings highlight the novelty and practical value of integrating symptom severity with operational telehealth data to derive pragmatic digital phenotypes of care intensity.

Digital Phenotyping of Anxiety-Depression Comorbidity in Tele-Mental Health: Severity Coupling and Resource-Use Signatures in a Real-World Cohort.

Digital Phenotyping of Anxiety-Depression Comorbidity in Tele-Mental Health: Severity Coupling and Resource-Use Signatures in a Real-World Cohort.

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