IEPA 11

Can new technologies address old problems in youth mental health treatment? How novel online social media and mobile technologies can address poor access to treatment and long-term outcomes.

Early intervention is now seen as the most promising and evidence-based approach to improve the long-term outcomes of mental disorders. Despite these advancements, current youth mental health services and services have major limitations. First, many young people with mental-ill health do not receive the mental health care they need, and access to effective interventions remains a lottery for families. Second, treatment for young people is often time-limited, and up to 70-80% of young people with psychosis or complex depression will experience relapses from their mental health conditions over the longer term. Likewise, engagement rates with effective interventions (either face to face or online) remain disappointingly low, limiting their ability to address long-term recovery. Finally, while current interventions are effective in reducing clinical symptoms, long-term social functioning deficits remain one of the most treatment resistant and costly aspect of mental health conditions such as psychosis.

In the context of high level of unmet need and limitations of existing treatments, we need to design and evaluate novel treatment approaches and modes of delivery. In this presentation we will present the latest work undertaken at Orygen (The National Centre of Excellence in Youth Mental Health, The University of Melbourne) on ehealth (eOrygen) to address these critical issues.