An app that helps take care of mental health

March 20, 2024 08:54 pm | Updated 08:54 pm IST - VIJAYAWADA

A pregnant woman jerks out of sleep in the middle of the night because of a nightmare about her baby. The more she looks up online about why she got such a dream, the more anxious she gets as the information she comes across only confirms her fears. As her situation worsens, she is suggested that she should see a psychiatrist.

There is a lot of information online. There is a lot of misformation too. When it comes to the content related to medicine and health, one can easily be misled by what one reads. “Had the woman known that nightmares are common during pregnancy, she would not have had to go through so much mental turmoil,” says noted psychiatrist Vishal Indla.

This was how the ideation for the app ‘avika’, a mental health platform that uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Virtual Reality (VR) to disseminate information on mental illnesses and ways to tackle them, happened, Dr. Indla says.

A group of four people including Dr. Indla (medical director), Sirisha Peyyeti (CEO), Srinivas Atreya (director) and Srinivas Pingali (director), all from Adndhra Pradesh and three of them from Vijayawada, came together to develop the app.

It was launched recently by Special Chief Secretary (Health) M.T. Krishna Babu at a programme attended by Andhra Pradesh State Council for Higher Education Chairman K. Hemachandra Reddy.

“There are so many people battling fears, anxiety, stress, grief and other milder forms of mental illnesses on a daily basis that may not necessitate a visit to a psychiatrist. Also, not many patients make the required follow-up visits to their doctors after treatments. The app does the hand-holding for those on the path to recovery,” Dr. Indla says.

Explaining about the features, Ms. Sirisha says the app has a bunch of options for a person battling anxiety or stress, including content by experts, music, journaling, affirmations and summaries of self-help books, available in four languages including Telugu.

“However, it has to be noted that this is not an alternative for treatment for serious psychiatric issues. But, it gives the resilience and mental boost to a person that can help calm themselves. It can also keep track of one’s medicines and send timely reminders,” Dr. Indla says.

The app does not store personal data of the users, the founders said, adding that the data in the system is end-to-end encrypted and cannot be accessed in an unauthorised manner.

At present, the app is only available to clinics which can recommend the app to the patients who they think need it for a charge.

“We are only looking at B2B model. We cannot put up the app for sale on online platform since it has to be routed through an expert. A few educational institutes from Andhra Pradesh and other States have come to us for making it available to their students free of cost. We are considering the option,” Ms. Sirisha adds.