Table 6 Summary of recommendations

a Recommendations for areas (or hospitals) of deficient workforce like western China (or community hospitals):

a1. Learning task sharing to transfer some mental health care responsibilities from more-specialized to less-specialized staff

b Recommendations for areas (or hospitals) like eastern China (or tertiary hospitals):

b1. The minimum requirements on education and training for psychotherapy workforce (such as at least being graduates of medicine or psychology) are in need to make the specialization in psychotherapy

b2. The measurable and minimum core criteria of psychotherapeutic training about theoretical training, self-experience and supervision should be created locally

c Recommendations for policy or regulations:

c1. The government not only needs to increase the number of mental health workforce but also strengthen the training of psychotherapy to enhance the quality of mental health services

c2. Providing standard clinical training for psychologists and adjusting the policy to making them access to hospital more flexibly could have great potentials to expand psychotherapy-related human resources

c3. Breaking down current policy barriers and establishing novel policy and regulations nationally and locally are imminent for China

d Other potential recommendations:

d1. Digital applications can extend the capacity and reach of the limited number of mental health specialists by facilitating off­site supervision and mentoring of local health and lay providers, reducing regional and hospital imbalances

d2. Online training and the use of peers to supervise therapy quality with structured scales and feedback have a potential for alleviating shortage of experienced trainers