The Potential Use of Smartphone Apps for Suicide Prevention
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Abstract
Background
The impact of digital technologies on many people’s lives is well documented. Evidence suggests that 40 percent of the general public use the internet to help them take care of their health. This shows the potential of the Internet as a resource in mental health awareness and suicide prevention. A number of recent studies have demonstrated that the impact of Internet-based mental health promotion may be positive, if it is supportive, informative and educational. One person commits suicide every 40 seconds; that is the global average. Young people are particularly at risk. Globally, suicide is one of the three leading causes of death among the 15-44 age group, and the second leading cause of death in the 15-19 years age group. In addition to the social cost, the economic cost of suicide is very high, estimated by the authors at approximately 126 billion euros annually, in the 27 EU countries. Suicidal behaviour is a life-threatening condition which is preventable and key to the prevention strategies is the ability to draw the citizen in to a positive and constructive communication with clinicians and this is where digital technologies offer an important new resource
Objective
Smartphone Apps based on the most common platforms will be developed to provide personalised guidance, support and awareness in order to encourage behavioural change in subjects with suicidal ideation The overall objective of this procedure is to evaluate eventual modifications in well-being of persons that use the Apps and to help detect and reduce suicidal behaviour
Methodology
This RCT Intervention study will target n=1800 plus control groups in six sites .App users will be asked to answer basic questionnaires and to maintain real-time on-line records. These responses are transmitted and stored at the local clinical centre. Users will be contacted by e-mail (accessed through their smartphone) and asked to complete scales like the WHO-5 measuring well-being, and others scales for depression, suicidal ideation and behaviours as well as attitudes regarding mental health and suicide. Apps will include:
- App1 based on clinical practice for patients attending hospital for suicidal concerns;
- App2 ,a suicide prevention based App where the goal is to pre-emptively detect risk cases and in this sense provide alerts to both patients and doctors and
- App3, entertainment based, following principles of psychology as applied in gamification.
Conclusions
The Apps will provide information on suicide prevention and will encourage self-management in a supportive environment to engineer awareness about healthy behaviours. The Apps will include real-time interpretation responses so that warning signs are immediately referred to the clinician. These Apps will be developed for specific at-risk groups including young persons, and persons suffering from depression. For national acceptance, a strong evaluated evidence base is required, involving the trial and evaluation of the Apps. The results from the interventions will be collated to provide a pooled epidemiological database on which statistical analyses and interpretation of results will be conducted. The evaluation will also involve a detailed economic evaluation of the Apps and their market potential.
The impact of digital technologies on many people’s lives is well documented. Evidence suggests that 40 percent of the general public use the internet to help them take care of their health. This shows the potential of the Internet as a resource in mental health awareness and suicide prevention. A number of recent studies have demonstrated that the impact of Internet-based mental health promotion may be positive, if it is supportive, informative and educational. One person commits suicide every 40 seconds; that is the global average. Young people are particularly at risk. Globally, suicide is one of the three leading causes of death among the 15-44 age group, and the second leading cause of death in the 15-19 years age group. In addition to the social cost, the economic cost of suicide is very high, estimated by the authors at approximately 126 billion euros annually, in the 27 EU countries. Suicidal behaviour is a life-threatening condition which is preventable and key to the prevention strategies is the ability to draw the citizen in to a positive and constructive communication with clinicians and this is where digital technologies offer an important new resource
Objective
Smartphone Apps based on the most common platforms will be developed to provide personalised guidance, support and awareness in order to encourage behavioural change in subjects with suicidal ideation The overall objective of this procedure is to evaluate eventual modifications in well-being of persons that use the Apps and to help detect and reduce suicidal behaviour
Methodology
This RCT Intervention study will target n=1800 plus control groups in six sites .App users will be asked to answer basic questionnaires and to maintain real-time on-line records. These responses are transmitted and stored at the local clinical centre. Users will be contacted by e-mail (accessed through their smartphone) and asked to complete scales like the WHO-5 measuring well-being, and others scales for depression, suicidal ideation and behaviours as well as attitudes regarding mental health and suicide. Apps will include:
- App1 based on clinical practice for patients attending hospital for suicidal concerns;
- App2 ,a suicide prevention based App where the goal is to pre-emptively detect risk cases and in this sense provide alerts to both patients and doctors and
- App3, entertainment based, following principles of psychology as applied in gamification.
Conclusions
The Apps will provide information on suicide prevention and will encourage self-management in a supportive environment to engineer awareness about healthy behaviours. The Apps will include real-time interpretation responses so that warning signs are immediately referred to the clinician. These Apps will be developed for specific at-risk groups including young persons, and persons suffering from depression. For national acceptance, a strong evaluated evidence base is required, involving the trial and evaluation of the Apps. The results from the interventions will be collated to provide a pooled epidemiological database on which statistical analyses and interpretation of results will be conducted. The evaluation will also involve a detailed economic evaluation of the Apps and their market potential.
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