scholarly journals The Use of Mobile Applications to Support Indigenous Youth Wellbeing in Canada

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Noella Noronha ◽  
Savanah J. Smith ◽  
Dawn Martin Hill ◽  
Lori Davis Hill ◽  
Sara Smith ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Mobile Applications ◽  
Holistic Health ◽  
Cultural Continuity ◽  
Indigenous Youth ◽  
Digital Platforms ◽  
Science Integration ◽  
Health Apps ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Boil Water Advisories

In Canada, Indigenous youth have remained resilient despite being confronted with a wide range of structural and systemic risks, such as long-lasting boil water advisories, over-representation in the child welfare system, and injustices related to land treaties. As people of the land, all disruptions to ecological health are a disruption to personal and community holistic health. Land-based activities and cultural continuity strengthen pathways of perseverance for Indigenous youth (Toombs et al., 2016). For youth, cultural self-expression and personal agency are enhanced with digital platforms, which are well-suited to Indigenous people’s strengths in art, music, and oral forms of passing on knowledge. The field of mental health has turned to e-supports such as mobile applications (apps) that can provide easy-to-access intervention, when needed. To date, resilience interventions have received comparatively less attention than the study of resilience factors and processes. It is timely to review the extant literature on mental health apps with Indigenous youth as, currently, Indigenous apps are in early research stages. Critically reviewing work to date, it is argued that an inclusive and expansive concept of resilience, coherent with Indigenous holistic health views, is well-positioned as a foundation for collaborative resilience app development. To date, few mental health apps have been researched with Indigenous youth, and fewer have been co-constructed with Indigenous youth and their community members. The current literature points to feasibility in terms of readiness or potential usage, and functionality for promoting an integrated cultural and holistic health lens. As this effort may be specific to a particular Indigenous nation’s values, stories, and practices, we highlight the Haudenosaunee conceptual wellness model as one example to guide Indigenous and non-Indigenous science integration, with a current project underway with the JoyPopTM mHealth app for promoting positive mental health and resilience.

Guidelines for Regulating or Rating Mental Health Mobile Applications: A Systematic Review (Preprint)

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qijin Cheng ◽  
Zirui Chen
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Systematic Review ◽  
Mental Health Professionals ◽  
Health Professionals ◽  
Mobile Applications ◽  
Chinese Literature ◽  
Professional Organizations ◽  
Health Apps ◽  
Key Stakeholders ◽  
Set Up

BACKGROUND Increasing number of mobile applications (apps) have been released to the market to address mental health needs; however, their quality varies. Mental health professionals have been advocating to set up regulating policies or rating guidelines to facilitate users to make informed choice. OBJECTIVE The study aims to map out the landscape and ecosystem of existing regulating policies and rating guidelines concerning mental health apps, streamline core rating criteria, and identify what knowledge and policy gaps exist. METHODS A systematic review was conducted on both English and Chinese literature. Not only academic publication databases but also popular search engines were searched to identify relevant policies or guidelines. Eligible publications were analyzed to identify key stakeholders in the ecosystem of regulating and rating mental health apps, and common approaches and criteria of the regulating or rating. What limitations exist and what improvement should be achieved in order to make good use of mental health apps were then discussed. RESULTS 56 articles were found to meet our inclusion criteria, covering 31 sets of regulating policies, rating protocols, or specific recommendations. Key stakeholders include app developers, governments, app stores, mental health professionals, and individual users. Only very few countries have released specific regulation policies for mental health apps, whereas app stores were almost absent on this matter. Mental health professionals have been advocating to set up rating guidelines but they did not always engage app developers or ordinary users. Regulation approach is to extend existing regulations on medical devices to mental health apps that self-claim for medical use. Quality rating approach is using either a checklist or a scoring scheme to rate mental health apps’ compliance with some criteria. Specific criteria include privacy and data protection, protecting user safety and minimize risks, evidence-based, usability and front-end accessibility, system interoperability, technical stability, cost, and information timeliness. CONCLUSIONS Only very few jurisdictions and professional organizations in the world have released regulating policies or rating guidelines on mental health apps, which can serve as a basis for other policymakers and professional organizations to adapt. The current regulating policies are rather vague with their applicable scope, whereas the current rating guidelines have relatively high requirement with raters’ capability. Future development needs to address the two major limitations. CLINICALTRIAL Nil.

scholarly journals A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW OF DIGITAL INTERVENTIONS ADDRESSING MENTAL DISORDERS AMONG THE ELDERLY POPULATION

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. S513-S514
Author(s):  
Md Mahbub Hossain ◽  
Samia Tasnim ◽  
Abida Sultana ◽  
Nishat Tasnim Hasan ◽  
Hoimonty Mazumder ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Mental Disorders ◽  
Elderly Population ◽  
Randomized Study ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Geriatric Population ◽  
Widespread Application ◽  
Digital Platforms ◽  
Digital Interventions ◽  
Wide Range

Abstract Background: Many studies have reported the widespread application of digital technologies in improving mental health. However, little is known about how these technological advancements can help the geriatric population who suffer from a wide range of mental disorders. There is no extensive review of evidence which can guide effective policy-making and implementation of such interventions. Objectives: To identify digital interventions addressing mental disorders among elderly people and evaluate the outcomes of these interventions. Methodology: According to the PRISMA guidelines, we searched six major health databases and screened the literature using these criteria: 1) journal articles reporting an intervention delivered using any of the digital platforms, 2) the interventions aimed to improve at least one mental disorder among geriatric population, 3) articles published in English language, 4) studies conducted in in any settings and time frame reporting any of the mental health-related outcomes. Results: Among 4870 articles found in the preliminary literature search, only 19 studies met our criteria. Most of the studies (n=14) described digital interventions addressing depressive illness among the elderly population. However, many interventions targeted multiple mental conditions including dementia, stress, anxiety, mood disorders, phobia, and functional disabilities. These interventions used internet-based therapies, mindfulness, digital assistants, and applications improving mental health behavior and practices. Most of the interventions (n=12) were evaluated using randomized study designs. Reported outcomes included improved symptoms, better quality of living, emotional and functional advancements, and decreased cost of treatment. This evidence necessitates further research and application of such technologies to improve geriatric mental health.

scholarly journals Moving beyond Protection with PULSE - Using A.I. to make healthcare more affordable and accessible

2019 ◽  
pp. 16
Author(s):  
Mohd Zameen Azuan Mohd Zahari
Keyword(s):  
Mobile Applications ◽  
Digital Health ◽  
Healthcare Access ◽  
Healthcare Delivery ◽  
Healthcare Providers ◽  
Holistic Health ◽  
Great Promise ◽  
Digital Revolution ◽  
Health Apps ◽  
The World

The world has never been more connected. According to leading market intelligence firm, IDC, there will be a staggering 25 million mobile applications by 2020 with a total of 50 trillion GB of data available worldwide. Mobile applications are not only taking the world by storm, it is also redefining and transforming healthcare delivery and experience. Currently there are over 325,000 health apps available in the top app stores worldwide with more than 200 apps being added each day. Worldwide, we are seeing how digital tools are leading to better and faster healthcare and making healthcare more empowering and accessible for the people. Goldman Sachs predicts that the digital revolution could potentially save healthcare providers USD300 billion. While the adoption of digital health tools such as mobile health apps holds great promise of improving healthcare access and patient outcomes, on the flip side, the popularity of health apps is also posing enormous and unprecedented risks to consumers’ privacy. PAMB is proactively transforming itself from a health payer to a holistic health manager through the implementation of PULSE, Prudential’s Health Ecosystem using the Prevent-Postpone-Protect strategy. In addition, Prudential has put measures in place to safeguard consumers’ privacy to ensure that data security is not compromised as we leverage on digital technology to provide consumers with instant, reliable and relevant health information at their fingertips as we empower and encourage the public to take charge of their health anytime, anywhere.International Journal of Human and Health Sciences Supplementary Issue: 2019 Page: 16

Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense mental health apps: A systematic literature review.

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 196-207 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine E. Gould ◽  
Brian C. Kok ◽  
Vanessa K. Ma ◽  
Aimee Marie L. Zapata ◽  
Jason E. Owen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Systematic Literature Review ◽  
Department Of Defense ◽  
Veterans Affairs ◽  
Health Apps

The call to Hawaii: Holistic practitioners’ perspectives of their communicative practices of healing

2009 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 133-144 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia Geist-Martin ◽  
Catherine Becker ◽  
Summer Carnett ◽  
Katherine Slauta
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Healing Process ◽  
Holistic Health ◽  
Communicative Practices ◽  
Ethnographic Interviews ◽  
Health Care Practices ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Care Practices ◽  
Holistic Health Care ◽  
Mutual Action

The big island of Hawaii has been named the healing island – a place with varied interpretations of healing, health, and a wide range of holistic health care practices. This research explores the perspectives of holistic providers about the communicative practices they believe are central to their interactions with patients. Intensive ethnographic interviews with 20 individuals revealed that they perceive their communication with clients as centered on four practices, specifically: (a) reciprocity – a mutual action or exchange in which both the practitioner and patient are equal partners in the healing process; (b) responsibility – the idea that, ultimately, people must heal themselves; (c) forgiveness – the notion that healing cannot progress if a person holds the burden of anger and pain; and (d) balance – the idea that it is possible to bring like and unlike things together in unity and harmony. The narratives revealed providers’ ontological assumptions about mind-body systems and the rationalities they seek to resist in their conversations with patients.

Assessment and Prediction of Privacy Concerns on Health Apps (Preprint)

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reham AlTamime ◽  
Vincent Marmion ◽  
Wendy Hall
Keyword(s):  
Data Sharing ◽  
Mobile Applications ◽  
Retention Rate ◽  
Mobile Apps ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Privacy Concerns ◽  
Health Apps ◽  
Mobile Health Apps ◽  
Specific Factors ◽  
And Control

BACKGROUND Mobile apps and IoT-enabled smartphones technologies facilitate collecting, sharing, and inferring from a vast amount of data about individuals’ location, health conditions, mobility status, and other factors. The use of such technology highlights the importance of understanding individuals’ privacy concerns to design applications that integrate their privacy expectations and requirements. OBJECTIVE This paper explores, assesses, and predicts individuals’ privacy concerns in relation to collecting and disclosing data on mobile health apps. METHODS We designed a questionnaire to identify participants’ privacy concerns pertaining to a set of 432 mobile apps’ data collection and sharing scenarios. Participants were presented with 27 scenarios that varied across three categorical factors: (1) type of data collected (e.g. health, demographic, behavioral, and location); (2) data sharing (e.g., whether it is shared, and for what purpose); and, (3) retention rate (e.g., forever, until the purpose is satisfied, unspecified, week, or year). RESULTS Our findings show that type of data, data sharing, and retention rate are all factors that affect individuals’ privacy concerns. However, specific factors such as collecting and disclosing health data to a third-party tracker play a larger role than other factors in triggering privacy concerns. CONCLUSIONS Our findings suggest that it is possible to predict privacy concerns based on these three factors. We propose design approaches that can improve users’ awareness and control of their data on mobile applications

Exclusive Breastfeeding Moderates the Association Between Prenatal and Postpartum Depression

2021 ◽  
pp. 089033442199105
Author(s):  
Bárbara Figueiredo ◽  
Tiago Miguel Pinto ◽  
Raquel Costa
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Mental Health ◽  
Postpartum Depression ◽  
Exclusive Breastfeeding ◽  
Maternal Mental Health ◽  
Prenatal Depression ◽  
Depression Symptoms ◽  
Public Health Services ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Prospective Longitudinal

Background Exclusive breastfeeding has a wide range of benefits for maternal health. However, the benefit of exclusive breastfeeding for maternal mental health needs to be further explored. Research Aim To determine the moderating role of exclusive breastfeeding at 3 months on the association between prenatal and postpartum depression. Methods This study had a prospective, longitudinal, and comparative design with two groups and three assessment waves. The sample comprised 334 participants (70 depressed and 264 non-depressed) recruited at public health services in northern Portugal. Participants completed a measure of depression symptoms between the second and the third trimester of pregnancy and between 3 and 6 months, and a measure of breastfeeding status at 3 months. Results Exclusive breastfeeding at 3 months moderated the association between prenatal and postpartum depression. Participants with prenatal depression who were exclusively breastfeeding at 3 months showed fewer symptoms of depression and lower rates of depression between 3 and 6 months postpartum, compared to participants with prenatal depression who were not exclusively breastfeeding. Participants without prenatal depression who were exclusively breastfeeding at 3 months showed similar depression symptoms and similar rates of depression between 3 and 6 months postpartum, compared to participants without prenatal depression who were not exclusively breastfeeding. Conclusion Exclusive breastfeeding has a potential protective influence on postpartum depression among women with prenatal depression. Public health policies targeting women with prenatal depression should be implemented and include practices to promote and support exclusive breastfeeding in order to enhance women’s exclusive breastfeeding and mental health.

scholarly journals Sexuality in Later Life and Mental Health Among Older Black Gay Men

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 313-314
Author(s):  
Darlingtina Esiaka ◽  
Alice Cheng ◽  
Candidus Nwakasi
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Gay Men ◽  
Later Life ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mental Wellbeing ◽  
Self Identity ◽  
Sexual Identities ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Black Gay Men

Abstract Self-acknowledgement and integration of racial and sexual identities are significant to one’s overall sense of identity because of their implications for mental health and wellbeing. These issues are important as one ages because older people experience a wide range of factors that add layers to their ability to (re)integrate subsets of their identity into their overall self-identity such as age and age-related disabilities. This study examined the intersection of race and sexual identities on overall health status in older Black gay men, a demographic group that has historically received less attention. Data from the Social Justice Sexuality (SJS) survey of LGBTQ+ people of color which occurred over a 12-month period in the United States were analyzed. Participants (N=160), 50 years and over, responded to questions about their sexuality, social identity, family dynamics, community connection and engagement, and mental and physical health. Results show an association of mental wellbeing with racial and sexual identities. Further, results show that a strong sense of connection to other sexual minorities is positively associated with mental health in older Black gay men. We discuss the implication of findings for mental health interventions targeting this gendered population.

The effects of mobile apps on stress, anxiety, and depression: overview of systematic reviews

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Fatemeh Khademian ◽  
Azam Aslani ◽  
Peivand Bastani
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Systematic Reviews ◽  
Behavioral Activation ◽  
Behavioral Therapy ◽  
Mobile Apps ◽  
Conclusive Evidence ◽  
Anxiety And Depression ◽  
Health Apps ◽  
Acceptance And Commitment ◽  
Overview Of Systematic Reviews

Abstract Objectives Despite a large number of mobile apps in the field of mental health, it is difficult to find a useful and reliable one, mainly due to the fact that the effectiveness of many apps has not been assessed scientifically. The present study aimed to assess the effects of mental health apps on managing the symptoms of stress, anxiety, and depression. Methods A comprehensive literature search was conducted in PubMed, Scopus, EMBASE, Cochrane, and Web of Science databases for the papers published from 2000 to 2019. Studies were included if they reviewed articles or mobile apps for their effectiveness in stress, anxiety, and depression. The reviews that had considered mobile apps or web-based mobile applications as an intervention or part of intervention were included, as well. Results A total of 4,999 peer-reviewed articles were identified, out of which nine systematic reviews met the inclusion criteria. Seven systematic reviews measured depression outcomes, three measured stress, and five systematic reviews measured anxiety symptoms. The applications that used behavior change strategies, such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, and Behavioral Activation, reported significant effects on depression, anxiety, and stress. Conclusion It seems that mental health apps can be promising media for reducing depressive symptoms. This field is an emerging area of mobile health, and further research should be done in future in order to reach conclusive evidence.

Cannabis use among early adolescents and transdiagnostic mental health risk factors

2021 ◽  
pp. 135910452199463
Author(s):  
Sara Moreno-Mansilla ◽  
Jorge J Ricarte ◽  
David J Hallford
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Risk Factors ◽  
Health Risk ◽  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
Intolerance Of Uncertainty ◽  
Cannabis Use ◽  
Health Risk Factors ◽  
Symptoms Of Depression ◽  
Modifiable Factors ◽  
Wide Range

Introduction: Cannabis is the most widely used psychoactive substance among adolescents worldwide, and the age at which consumption begins to decrease. Cannabis use in adolescents is associated with a wide range of adverse consequences in adulthood including increased vulnerability to psychosis and other mental disorders, as well as suicidal ideation and attempt. The aim of this study is to extend understanding of the link between cannabis use and mental illness by examining whether cannabis use at early ages predicts transdiagnostic variables that are precursors to severe clinical diagnoses. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted. The sample was made up of 605 adolescents from 7th to 9th grades, with a mean age of 13.2 years ( SD = 1.0, 47% girls). The variables evaluated were: anomalous perception of reality, intolerance of uncertainty, rumination, suicide attempt, hopelessness, and symptoms of depression and anxiety. The administration of the questionnaires was carried out in groups of 20 participants under the supervision of a researcher in a unique session of 1 hour. Results: Adolescent cannabis users scored higher on all variables assessed: anomalous perception of reality (Cohen’s d = .60), rumination ( d = .48), intolerance of uncertainty ( d = .11), suicidal attempt (affirmative answer: 25.9% of users vs 7.7% of non-users), hopelessness ( d = .85), symptoms of depression ( d = .80), and anxiety ( d = .39). A binary logistic regression showed that the only variable uniquely related to cannabis use was hopelessness (Wald = 4.560, OR: 1.159, p = .033). Conclusions: Among some mental health risk factors, hopelessness appears uniquely related to cannabis use. Adolescents may use cannabis as a coping strategy for negative thoughts and emotions, or it may be a consequence of cannabis use. Future prevention programs should focus on preventing/treating modifiable factors such as hopelessness, and delaying cannabis use in specific subgroups of adolescents who experience pathologies such as depression or suicide attempts.

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