The acceptability of web-care for patients with major depressive disorder

Abstract

Introduction

With the extraordinary rate of development of E-health and widespread internet access in Romania, Inomedica decided to create a platform dedicated primarily to the patients and their families: depresiv.ro. According to Internet Live Stats there were 11,178,477 Internet users in Romania (representing 51.66% of the population) in 2014. Inomedica is a non-governmental organization founded by a multidisciplinary team (psychiatrists, sociologists, IT specialists).

The platforms provide rigorous and quality online information about depression as well as self-assessment tools and Q&A section.

The presentation will explore the development and effects of the first 16 months of operation of a web platform about depression.

Methods

The depresiv.ro platform design is simple and user friendly. Mental health specialists contributed to the development of the content, which is easy to access and understand.

The platform also provides access to a self-evaluation tool, the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), and thus helps the users identify possible problems and encourage them to seek professional help. The web application also included a demographic questionnaire, and a medical history questionnaire. A native iOS version of the application is available to download free on AppStore. The platform is supported by a Google grant program.

Results

The platform traffic increased from a few users per day at launch to more than 1000 unique visitors per day. Since 1st January 2015, about 178,000 unique visitors accessed the platform. All the metrics improved significantly during the last months: bounce rate (66.3%), average session duration (02:17 minutes), number of pages per session (2.4).

About 25,000 users accessed the HADS application since its release, from August 2014 until September 2015, showing the increasing need for free online self-evaluation tools.

The Q&A section is one of the most visited on the platform since many users try to find answers for their questions regarding depressive or anxiety symptoms.

Conclusions

As new technologies are introduced and become more accessible, mental health specialists are developing new ways of providing services and collecting data. The traffic data/usage for both the depresiv.ro platform and the app are evidence for the widespread acceptability of web-based delivery methods.

Disclosure of interest

The authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.