Users need assistance in product discovery and thoughtfully crafted ways to overcome their habits and anxieties. Looking at it from a product perspective, a lifetime value analysis of a mental health system user must consider the journey it takes to acquire them. Users onboard into the app too late in the process, sometimes with suicidal thoughts, and the apps lack the ability to connect users to real support systems in their communities. Joyable, Two Chairs, and other companies are creating digital solutions to book your first (or next) mental health appointment with therapists, but we wondered: How do we reach people in their local communities if they don’t have exclusive access to a computer or phone? How can we encourage someone to share something about themselves with someone else (shared vulnerabilities), or even with themselves (self-reflection)?Įven digital health apps, mental health related or not, are typically unprepared to help users working through an acute mental health issue find local services.
This first experience might be anything from trying to book a new patient appointment with a therapist, finding free mental health services in your community, or even something as simple as being comfortable expressing a vulnerability. How can we reduce the anxieties and barriers to your first mental health experience? My team decided to focus on one consistently hard to tackle problem in this space: for people aged 15–24.Ĥ6% of homeless adults live with severe mental illness and/or substance abuse disorders. Suicide is the second leading cause of death in the U.S. adults experiences mental illness in a given year. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness :ġ in 5 U.S. In the current century, mental health has become one of the biggest challenges our nation faces. Solutions using VR, chatbots, and many other technologies aimed to tackle this compelling hackathon prompt: Cards FOR Humanity: ‘we care’ Community Mental Health CareboxesĪt the #HackMentalHealth UCSF hackathon this spring, over 500 people formed 60 teams to build creative solutions addressing mental health issues.