Dr. Derek Richards

Derek completed his PhD in psychology at Trinity College Dublin under the supervision of Ladislav Timulak. His PhD work built on his pioneering efforts to use technology in mental health and wellbeing that begun in early 2000's where at that time he began developing his ideas about how to usefully engage emerging technologies to support healthcare delivery, but in particular mental health and wellbeing. To begin with, he built the first online mental health community in Ireland for students at TCD. The service was developed and launched and was used widely among students at TCD. The service provided to students access to a wide range of mental health and wellbeing information, a peer support moderated forum to discuss mental health and wellbeing and also online asynchronous counselling. Students could write a submission to the counselling staff, it was reviewed and a personal reply drafted and sent to the individual, the message was stripped of any identifying information and later posted with the reply to the online community; thereby acting as a psychoeducation for the entire registered community. Post-PHD, Dr Richards spend time as a post-doc at the National University of Mexico (UNAM), working with Professor Geogrina Cardenes-Lopez at the cyberpsychology lab where he was collaborating on a number of projects at the lab, including a rollout of an online intervention for depression in Mexico. After 8 months at UNAM Dr Richards took a faculty position as Assistant Professor of research at the University Narino, Bogota, Colombia (April 2011-September 2012). This was a unique position with a brief of helping to establish a research agenda for the faculty of psychology. At this time Dr Richards engaged in securing funding from the University for research in the epidemiology of depression and plans for researching an online intervention. He also supervised a number of master's theses. On returning to Ireland in September 2012, Dr Richards began working closely with the SilverCloud team, eventually taking the decision to move fulltime to the commercial outfit in September 2013 as Director of Clinical Research and Innovation and later Chief Science Officer, his current position. He also retained his contact with academia, at first as a Research Fellow and now as a Senior Research Fellow at the School of Psychology, Trinity College Dublin where he is a Co-Director of E-Mental Health Research Group. In the intervening years Dr Richards has designed and executed a number of trials of online interventions for mental health and wellbeing www.ementalhealthgroup.com people.tcd.ie/drichard

  ANXIETY   Behavior and Health   Clinical psychology   Culture and health   Depression   Emotional/Mental Health   Emotional/Mental Health--Minorities   Health Care   Health, Clinical and Counselling   Health/Medical Science--Computer Technology   Men's Health   Mental Disorders   Mental Health Services   ONLINE MENTAL HEALTH   ONLINE SYSTEMS   Philosophy of science   Psychiatry   Psychoanalysis   Psychotherapy   TECHNOLOGY AND MENTAL HEALTH   Technology Assessment/Transfer/Outreach (Hlth   Telemedicine   Therapy Evaluation

One in four people will be affected by a mental health condition in any given year.. Increasing global awareness of the prevalence of mental health conditions has made prevention and treatment a public health priority. Yet, current in-person clinical treatments are labor intensive, have limited availability, and often costly, creating long wait times and other barriers for those seeking access to the treatments they need. To meet the growing demand for effective and sustainable mental healthcare services, digitally-delivered psychotherapy interventions offer increased access to evidence-based care. Among these, Internet-delivered Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (iCBT) has emerged as the primary method to provide accessible, scalable, digital behavioral healthcare.  Digital healths contribution to mental and behavioural healthcare has been significant, but we also know that we have most likely only begun to scratch the surface of the potential that current and emerging technologies can offer. It is a fascinating and innovative time for psychological science as it embraces technology to support the dissemination and greater access and reach to evidence-based treatments, preventative programmes and for the first time the potential to globalise these efforts. Breakthrough advances in AI and machine learning technology can be used to further enhance these comprehensive digital services by more effectively personalizing digital interventions. Understanding patient engagement and what components of the CBT-based intervention work for different groups of patients can help personalize the delivery of CBT-based interventions to minimize drop-out and improve patient outcomes, as well as enable healthcare professionals to triage patients at an earlier stage. In addition, the session will detail how a human-centric approach to AI and machine learning can assist in the detection, diagnosis, monitoring, and treatment of mental health conditions. I am very interested in the development, implementation and research of technology-delivered interventions for mental health problems. In particular, some of the current areas of interest include: Efficacy and effectiveness of digital health interventions Qualitative psychological experiences of service users and supporters Long-term conditions management Cultural adaptation and personalisation of digital health interventions Implementation science & practice Machine-based learning and AI approaches to digital health Device integration and experimentation