7 Trends in Digital Mental Health for 2020

Dec 11, 2019

It has been a busy year for digital mental health. While no one knows what 2020 will bring, some themes are sure to continue to shape the field.

The year 2019 was a busy one for digital health and especially digital mental health. While no one knows what 2020 will bring, some themes are sure to continue to shape the field. Take a peak at some predictions for the year ahead and rescues to prepare you for what is coming next.

The message from 2019 has been clear. In real world use cases, most mental health apps are rarely opened more than just a few times. Brush up the latest data around engagement with this terrific paper from Baumel and colleagues: Objective User Engagement With Mental Health Apps: Systematic Search and Panel-Based Usage Analysis.

It is easy for mental health technologies and apps to make bold claims – but are these claims actually true? Understand the gap between claims and clinical evidence and how to bridge it in 2020 with this paper: Using science to sell apps: Evaluation of mental health app store quality claims.

Who pays for digital mental health and what partnerships work? 2019 saw more focus on subscriptions, but hyped partnerships with pharma also collapsed later in the year. Compare this 2018 press release to the 2019 version to learn about trends likely to continue in 2020.

US Presidential candidates already started discussing regulation in digital health in 2019. Can we expect updates and perhaps even changes to PreCert in 2020?

While engagement with digital health tools may be low, peer support bucked the trend in 2019. Peers will likely take a center role in advancing this space in 2020. New care team members, digital navigators will also emerge in 2020 to help integrate technology into care setting.

Research and real world events highlighted numerous privacy flaws in digital health tools, including mental health ones in 2019. As people begin to demand their health data remain private, watch for changes in 2020.

Expanded app evaluation resources and efforts from the American Psychiatric Association with more videos and tools to help you make informed decisions will be coming in 2020. SMI Adviser continues to expand its offering of resources, webinars, learning collaboratives, and free consultations around many topics including technology for serious mental illness.

Dr Torous is Director of the Digital Psychiatry Division, Department of Psychiatry at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston; Editor in Chief of JMIR Mental Health; and Digital Psychiatry Editor for Psychiatric Times. Twitter: @JohnTorousMD.