Michigan State University (MSU) is trying to tackle student depression by creating an app called iSee, meant to diagnose students for symptoms of depression.
The developers of the app expect it to “supplement in-person counselling services” by providing health professionals with more information on students’ mental health, according to a press release from MSU. iSee requires the use of both a smartwatch and smartphone, which tracks student behavioural patterns such as heart rate, location, physical activity, sleeping habits, and social behaviour.
The information will be used to gather “useful analytics . . . to help clinicians make clinical decisions and provide treatment,” the release said. The app is also expected to reduce the number of “unnecessary visits” to health and counselling services by providing “in-the-moment” therapies to help treat depression.
People under 20-years-old are the most likely age group to experience depression, according to the Mood Disorders Society of Canada.
Patty Allen, a mental health nurse for Carleton University’s Health and Counselling Services, said people cannot “self-diagnose” their mental health problems.
“It’s not healthy, it’s not a good thing,” Allen said. “Most people can get in to see a physician, physicians can do assessments for depression. and they can diagnose. Usually you’re not waiting too long.”
However, Allen said she likes that the app will be able to track exercise levels of students.
“Whenever we see students, whether it’s just a low mood or stress, the number one thing we recommend is exercise. So, if you’ve got an app that’s encouraging you to do that, that’s just a bonus,” she said.
Allen said Carleton’s Health and Counselling Services uses a few apps developed by the Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre to help students with mental health.
“I’d prefer to think of them as an addition to [clinical treatment], not that they’re a standalone in any way. People still need the support if they’ve been diagnosed with anxiety or depression,” she said.
Michael Mac Neil, a Carleton legal studies professor with expertise in internet privacy, said he thinks the iSee app “raises many significant privacy concerns.”
“A great deal of very personal data would be collected, and it would be incredibly important that any person who agreed to allow themselves to be monitored through the use of the app should have a very clear and complete understanding of how the data that is being collected is going to be used, stored, shared and destroyed,” he said.
Mac Neil added that despite the app’s effectiveness, those privacy risks should be taken into account.
“It strikes me that there are huge risks that must be addressed and which be so large that they might not justify the adoption of the app,” he said.
– Photo by Angela Tilley
