Mental health issues often don't get into the headlies of many discussions regarding public health. However, this is one area where technology could go a long way.
We wanted to implement a system where people could have access to effective, yet discrete mental health support. In a nutshell, we wanted to build a safe space.
We've spent a long time ignoring a multitude of facets of life under the tag of "man up" or dont be a baby, or to quote David rose from Schitt's Creek...
This needs to change. It's gonna happen only if we start talking about it openly. Take off the stigma around it.
So we got a chance to take part in a state wide hackathon and we picked the healthcare track. We wanted to build something that (duh, would win, but also) once deployed, could help make atleast a minor difference in a few people's lives.
As they say, Baby steps. Baby steps first.
Mentem was originally intended to be an all in one platform for health clinics to provide assistance,and for people like you and me to seek medical support.
Here's a quick video showing what is included out of the box.
What we have is a web app, which for the average user, works like a chatbot presents takes questions from the MS test (a standardized test for measuring mental health). The reports are sent to a medical practitioner.
There's a live chat feature for consultation, which implements a few emotion/sentiment detection models and gives the results to the doctor during the video chat.
We were given exposure to professionals in the field of mental health, and desicions on implementations were taken after consulting with them.
Find the slides we used here
Cover Image: Freepik
Schitt's Creek: spotern