From apps to avatars, new tools for taking control of your mental health
After a friend’s suicide last year, Zach Schleien sought some answers through an online discussion forum. He was riveted by the people who shared their pain, such as the 19-year-old woman who never left her room and the man with schizophrenia trying to manage the warring voices in his head. Schleien started wondering whether there was something he could do to help alleviate such suffering.
His solution turned out to be simpler than he expected: A Slack channel, a private online community for people in lifeor-death struggles reaching out in real time to save one another.
Schleien, who works in business technology in New Jersey, called the channel 18percent for the 18 percent of the U.S. population living with mental illness. Launched this year by a nonprofit that Schleien founded with David Markovich, an internet marketing consultant, the channel has about 150 members who have sent more than 11,000 messages.
Someone who might “feel alone and isolated can reach out at 2 a.m. and find someone on the other side of the world,” Schleien said. “And that connection, finding that other peer who has walked your walk, could potentially save a life.”
Mental-health care is no longer limited to psychiatric drugs and face-to-face counseling. Half of all U.S. counties have no psychiatrist, psychologist or social worker, and that lack of access, plus cost, has put traditional treatment beyond the reach of many. The breach is now being filled with “digiceuticals,” part of a new field of mental-health technology that includes smartphone chatbots that text self-help advice for those dealing with depression as well as virtual-reality-exposure therapy for individuals battling anxiety disorders.
There is more on the electronic horizon, for both the worried well who want to relieve everyday stresses and the more seriously mentally ill. Pepper, a humanoid robot that moves naturally and is capable of “reading” a person’s emotions, has conducted meditation and mindfulness classes for British college students. For people with schizophrenia, avatars that embody a person’s auditory hallucinations also show promise. Some critics call this technology scene a kind of “Wild West.” Of the more than 165,000 health-related apps worldwide, 30,000 are dedicated to mental health, according to the IMS Institute for Healthcare Informatics. But few have been rigorously tested, and a lack of regulatory oversight has prompted concerns about “whether these apps have sufficient safeguards, and what are the indications for who should be using them and in what way,” said Nicole Martinez-Martin, a bioethicist and research fellow at the Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics.
The National Institute of Mental Health acknowledges both the pros and the cons of the “new technology frontier,” with the risk to health privacy among the additional negatives. There are advantages, it says, including anonymity, cost, convenience and 24hour service.
“Technology may be a good first step for those who have avoided mental health care in the past,” NIMH notes.
Young people seem especially receptive, given their constant use of electronic devices, say technology designers and researchers. For them, turning to a smartphone or tablet when they have a problem is second nature. The ease and anonymity of apps also makes seeking help less stigmatizing.
“Personally, I always have my phone,” said Kayleigh, a 16-year-old in the Midwest with anxiety that is sometimes debilitating. The high school student, who spoke on the condition that her last name not be used, began using the 18percent Slack channel just a few weeks ago. As someone who has been bullied, she said, she likes that the conversations are confidential and that what’s shared can’t be searched on the internet. Not having to set up an account was reassuring for privacy, and knowing that others on the channel have similar issues made her feel comfortable reaching out.
“If I walk into a room and I’m anxious or alone in my house,” Kayleigh said, “I will jump on [Slack] and say, ‘Hey, guys, I need some help now.’ Usually someone will say, ‘Yeah, what’s up?’ quickly.”
The Slack channel is free. Other apps charge, though their price is usually far less than the cost of seeing a psychotherapist. Ginger.io, for instance, allows a user to text a mental-health specialist and receive a reply within a minute, no matter the time of day. It costs anywhere from $129 a month for 24/7 access to a mental-health coach to $349 a month for the same service plus two video sessions with a licensed psychiatrist.
But a simpler option such as notOK, a kind of digital panic button developed this year by siblings Hannah and Charlie Lucas in Georgia, will set you back a mere $1.99 a month. When someone taps the notOK app, a 13-word text – “Hey, I’m not OK. Please call me, text me, or come find me” – is sent along with a GPS notification of the person’s location to a select number of “trusted contacts” chosen by the user. These might be friends, family members or peers, all of whom must live close enough to be able to drive to the person if necessary. (Users are instructed to first call 911 if they are in danger of hurting themselves.)
Inspiration for the app came from Hannah after she developed a disorder that causes frequent fainting. For the depression and anxiety that followed, she knew she needed a way to get assistance immediately.
“Depression inhibits a person’s ability to ask for help,” 16-year-old Hannah explained last week. “Depression tells you you’re alone and no one wants to listen to you. This makes it easier to say you need help, without trying to put it into words.”
Both she and her brother, who is 13, have heard from users about how much notOK has meant to them – for a variety of issues, including panic attacks and recovery from drug addiction. The app has been downloaded about 12,000 times since it was made available in late January, with approximately 3,000 hits of the button every month, according to Charlie.