期刊名称：Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health
印刷版ISSN：1753-2000
电子版ISSN：1753-2000
出版年度：2021
卷号：15
DOI：10.1186/s13034-021-00401-6
语种：English
出版社：BioMed Central
摘要：Background
The access to empirically-supported treatments for common mental disorders in children and adolescents is often limited. Mental health apps might extend service supplies, as they are deemed to be cost-efficient, scalable and appealing for youth. However, little is known about the quality of available apps. Therefore, we aimed to systematically evaluate current mobile-based interventions for pediatric anxiety, depression and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Methods
Systematic searches were conducted in
Google Play Store and
Apple App Store to identify relevant apps. To be eligible for inclusion, apps needed to be: (1) designed to target either anxiety, depression or PTSD in youth (0–18 years); (2) developed for children, adolescents or caregivers; (3) provided in English or German; (4) operative after download. The quality of eligible apps was assessed with two standardized rating systems (i.e.,
Mobile App Rating Scale (MARS) and
ENLIGHT) independently by two reviewers.
Results
Overall, the searches revealed 3806 apps, with 15 mental health apps (0.39%) fulfilling our inclusion criteria. The mean overall scores suggested a moderate app quality (MARS: M = 3.59, SD = 0.50; ENLIGHT: M = 3.22, SD = 0.73). Moreover, only one app was evaluated in an RCT. The correlation of both rating scales was high (
r = .936; p < .001), whereas no significant correlations were found between rating scales and user ratings (
p > .05).
Conclusions
Our results point to a rather poor overall app quality, and indicate an absence of scientific-driven development and lack of methodologically sound evaluation of apps. Thus, future high-quality research is required, both in terms of theoretically informed intervention development and assessment of mental health apps in RCTs. Furthermore, institutionalized best-practices that provide central information on different aspects of apps (e.g., effectiveness, safety, and data security) for patients, caregivers, stakeholders and mental health professionals are urgently needed.
Supplementary Information
The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13034-021-00401-6.
