Improving children and young people’s mental health through digital innovation
Mental health problems are more pronounced for children and young people facing health inequity. We have been providing funding and evaluation support to digital innovations aiming to close mental health equity gaps for children and young people in the South West.
Children’s mental health needs in the South West are higher than in any other region in England. Disadvantaged children and young people have poorer access to services and health outcomes, and mental health problems are more pronounced for those facing inequity.
Our Health Equity Innovation Challenge 2022 has been supporting innovations aiming to improve mental health equity gaps for children and young people.
Three of the six successful innovations are using digital technology to support children and young people experiencing inequity:
- TellMi is a digital peer-support service targeting 11–25-year-olds from rural areas and lower socio-economic groups. Tellmi is being tested and evaluated for scale up by NHS Somerset with our support. We are supporting Tellmi to understand how it can be integrated into the Somerset pathway, and improve understanding of young people in relation to health inequity.
- BFB Labs is testing a NICE-recommended game-based digital therapeutic intervention, Lumi Nova: Tales of Courage, for children aged 7-12 years, from lower socio-economic rural and coastal areas, designed to improve self-management and reduce anxiety. Our partnership with BFB Labs is exploring the potential to improve access, focusing on children living in socio-economically deprived and rural communities.
- Good With is a CBT-informed digital financial wellbeing support app for young people who are experiencing sub-clinical anxiety. We have been supporting the Good With team to test the effectiveness of their intervention for users who are experiencing financial difficulties and anxiety.
Tellmi
- 331 young people joined Tellmi, compared to 46 in the six months prior to the study, indicating that engagement work is important to increasing access.
- Qualitative data highlights the lived experience and challenges of young people in Somerset with anxiety.
- Significant learning around the challenges of real-world evaluation, including the timing of data capture and the outcome tools used.
BFB Labs
- 185 children signed up to the Lumi Nova intervention at rural and socio-economically deprived sites.
- Children & Family Health Devon have said they will continue to signpost suitable children to the Lumi Nova intervention.
- Self-sign-up was found to be the most common access mechanism.
Good With
- Financially vulnerable users reported significantly greater levels of financial anxiety, lower levels of wellbeing, and lower self-efficacy than less financially vulnerable users.
- The intervention had greater impact on financially vulnerable users, with stronger indications of improved levels of financial wellbeing after engagement.
- Learning to take into future large-scale testing includes app design and content, approaches to real-world evaluation, and populations who may benefit most from its support.
“The funding and support we received from Health Innovation South West gave us the opportunity to empirically test our prototype with a group of test users who need it most. The insights we have drawn from this work have helped us to shape the future of the product and the service we offer to young adults.”
Dr Ellie Kallis PhD, Chief Scientific Officer, Good With Ltd
