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So, what are Mental Health Apps?
Mental health apps are one of the most inventive tools to be introduced to the healthcare industry and have something to offer practitioners and patients alike. With mental health apps, healthcare professionals can manage all information and channels from the comfort of their pocket, and work towards building and strengthening client relationships outside of the office. As effective practice management tools, mental health applications can increase productivity and efficiency across business operations, and allow you to streamline your workload simply and without complication. They’re easy, cheap, and no matter your technical skill, anyone can use them and hit the ground running. However, we acknowledge that it can sometimes be overwhelming when evaluating your options, especially with the number of choices out there! That’s why we’re here to help guide you through the best options for a variety of different purposes and price points.
How Mental Health Professionals Use Apps
While every mental health app provides its own unique benefits, there are various universal features that most apps have that work wonders in healthcare professions. Practitioners can easily take advantage of the following aspects, to name a few:
Communication features - Most mental health apps provide avenues for online messaging and video calling, meaning that you can connect with clients and stay up to date at any time and place. It’s highly flexible and highly convenient!
Produce and store clinical documents - Documentation is one of the most important aspects of healthcare, however tedious it can be. Mental health applications ensure that you’re able to note all essential information in an easily digestible format with minimal errors, as well as store them securely. You can access all information from one place, as well as create more accurate notes in a shorter amount of time.
Appointment scheduling - Many apps implement appointment booking software, meaning that your patients can book sessions without hassle, or the need to go through you. You can free up time and work elsewhere, whilst scheduling as many clients as resources allow.
Appointment reminders - You can also remind patients of their upcoming sessions, which can work towards heavily reducing no-shows, and thus, saving your practice time and money.
Access templates - It’s okay to acknowledge that you may need help from time to time, with mental health apps providing you with the means to know how to create high-quality resources, emails, messages, forms, and other tools.
Online payments - Mental health apps are great for processing finances quickly, and generating invoices in seconds! You can ensure you’re reimbursed for your therapist sessions on time, with no delays.
Electronic Health Records - Keep all your patient information secure, and accessible from just one place. You can maintain better notes, medical bills, and coding, as all the relevant details are right in front of you for greater organization.
Why Mental Health Apps Matter in 2023
While mental health apps provide obvious benefits, you may be wondering why it matters. Fortunately, now more than ever, these types of applications prove immensely advantageous to healthcare businesses, regardless of profession or size.
Greater patient engagement - With the ability to communicate with patients at any time and place, you can effectively work towards higher engagement with your clients. You can provide round-the-clock support, and demonstrate a level of care that highlights that your patients are more than just a number.
More convenient - Naturally, being able to access information from your pocket isn’t just beneficial for the patient, but also for you. You can work towards delivering high-quality healthcare solutions at any place, without worrying about social distancing, or any other recently concerning matters.
Low-cost - With worldwide recessions and rising living costs, you must realize that at the end of the day, you’re running a business, and you need to be able to make a profit. With mental health apps, you can access many features for free, or at a small monthly fee.
Broaden your clientele - Mental health apps are a great way to provide support to those who may be living in isolated or rural communities, allowing these demographics to supply a great opportunity for you to expand your client list and widen your clientele. This is an excellent way to get your name out there and to attend to those who truly need your help.
Better self-monitoring - With features that track data and allow patients to gain some control over aspects of their health experience, mental health apps work towards greater self-monitoring that can breed higher clinical outcomes.
The Top 10 Mental Health Apps
To help you out, we’ve evaluated the mental health market and provided you with the top 10 apps out there that you may want to consider implementing within your practice to elevate the quality of your therapist services.
Best Overall: Carepatron
Used by over 10,000+ healthcare professionals worldwide, Carepatron prioritizes efficiency, productivity and organization to ensure that you can deliver high-quality healthcare solutions without compromise. At a free cost or premium of $12-19 per month, you can easily schedule appointments with effective reminder software, consult through video and messaging, produce and store clinical documents, as well as access medical billing and coding resources, in addition to Electronic Health Records. It’s your one-stop shop and ensures your data is secure, through an easy-to-use interface.
Best for Therapy: BetterHelp
As the world’s largest therapy service, it’s no surprise that BetterHelp is a strong contender for mental health professionals. BetterHelp provides smart provider matching to connect practitioners with clients and uses high-resolution video consulting and messaging services to allow you to receive help from anywhere in the world. However, this does come at a hefty cost and misses the mark in terms of providing common practice management features.
Best for Assessment: Blueprint Health
Blueprint promotes high-quality evidence-based care in ensuring that you spend less time on documentation, and more time on the things that matter. You can work towards greater session plans that are rich in detail, and that also produce unique insights for you to incorporate in future treatment plans. Although, this application does cost $39 per month, following a free trial, to be able to access its full features.
Best for Video calls: Zoom
Recently made popular through the COVID-19 pandemic, Zoom continues to remain on top of the game when it comes to video consults and calls with patients. With messaging and cloud storage features, Zoom makes for a great no-fuss option if you’re needing the barebones healthcare virtual experience. However, this can be pricey at upwards of $150 annually to meet beyond 40-minute limits, with many valuable practice management features missing.
Best for Meditation: Calm
Calm is an excellent app that prioritizes health and wellbeing in terms of sleep and meditation. With high-quality resources, audios, and programs, Calm makes for a great healthcare solution. However, from $50 annually, this can be on the expensive side, and there is also a limited opportunity for healthcare practitioners to implement this within their practice. There is little room to design your own programs, and rather, Calm serves more as a product than a service, which can have lesser impacts on patients’ long-term health!
Best Scheduling automation: Calendy
A popular appointment scheduling choice, Calendy is a great way to organize all your information across your calendars and ensure that you’re on time and on top of your workload. With sophisticated automation features, you can eliminate distractions and minimize interruptions. However, with healthcare businesses, you will need to be able to accommodate high workloads, data, and patient information, which Calendly may provide at a cost from $8-16 per month. Yet, this also doesn’t include appointment scheduling on the patient end, which is a missed opportunity for you to impart some level of control over to your clients.
Best for whiteboarding: Miro
Miro is a great way for you and your staff, or patients, to collaborate on ideas, business operations, treatment plans, and whatever else. With an easy user interface that prioritizes intuition and cleanliness, you can use Miro to work with confidence. However, to access business features such as SSO access, you will need to pay upwards of $16 per month.
Best for Creative: Canva
Canva is a fantastic way to foster creativity and boost the visual appeal of your business. With many free templates available, you can design and create marketing campaigns that work towards attracting more clients, and increasing engagement. However, this service is not designed with the specific mental health discipline in mind and does require a Pro account for over $30 per month for enterprises.
Best for Video Recording: Loom
Loom is a great way to capture high-resolution screen and camera recordings, which is fantastic for hybrid workplaces. You can access unlimited information, creations, and recording length to boost branding from $8 per month.
Best for website: Webflow
Creating a website is one of the easiest ways to establish an online presence, and get your name out there, with Webflow providing a way for you to do so without coding or technical experience. You can easily design and build a website in the way you want to, without compromising on quality. However, this can cost anywhere from $12-36 per month if needing access to greater CMS features, which is essential for healthcare.
Take Home Message
Mental health apps are important, including those that may not directly be in the same line of work, but can help contribute towards a more elevated quality of services. Technology is your friend, and these services can work to increase productivity and efficiency, without compromising your priorities of treating patients’ mental health. We hope this evaluation has provided you with the right information for you to hit the ground running, and do what you do best!
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