Depression: Is There an App for That?

In the world today, it seems like there’s an app for everything: ordering food, finding deals on clothes, driving directions, and even finding friends: but is there an effective app for reducing the symptoms of depression?

We’ve published an article on a related topic on our blog:

What are the Benefits and Drawbacks of Digital Therapeutics in Mental Health Treatment?

That article explores, as the title implies, the relative strengths and weaknesses for digital therapeutics – i.e. apps and other computer or phone-based therapeutic devices – for general mental health purposes.

A new study called “App-Based Interventions for Moderate to Severe Depression: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis” has a narrower focus, and examines whether an app can reduce symptoms in people diagnosed with moderate or severe major depressive disorder (MDD).

About the Study: Smartphones and Depression Treatment

The research team identified this primary goal:

“To examine the treatment efficacy associated with mobile app interventions for moderate to severe depression and identify the potential moderators associated with better treatment outcomes.”

To achieve this goal, researchers analyzed the results of 13 studies including 1,470 patients with moderate to severe depression. They identified levels of depression and depressive symptoms measured by standard depression metrics at baseline and after intervention with app-based therapeutics. To measure the effectiveness of the apps, researchers compared post-intervention levels of depressive symptoms between patients who used apps, participants who engaged in other forms of therapy, and patients who didn’t engage in any therapy at all.

Researchers labeled patients who used apps as the experimental group, patients who engaged in other forms of treatment the active control group, and patients who didn’t engage in therapy the inactive control group.

Here’s what they found.

Depression Treatment: Effect of a Digital App on Symptoms

Statistical analysis of results showed that using for patients with depression, a phone-based therapeutic app reduced depressive symptoms in:

• Experimental group vs. active control group
  • Effect size: 0.175
• Experimental group vs. inactive control group
  • Effect size: 0.765

We’ll explain what those results mean, below.

Outcomes: How Effective Are Apps for Depression Treatment?

Let’s talk about what the term effect size.

The average effect size for both groups was 0.50, which means that 69 percent of the control group experienced fewer reductions than the average reductions in the experimental group.

In psychological research, that’s called a medium effect size.

As we can see, compared to the active control group, the effect size was relatively small. Fifty-eight (58) percent of active control group experienced fewer reductions than the experimental group. But compared to the inactive control group, the effect size was greater. Around 75 percent of the inactive control group showed fewer reductions than the experimental group.

In psychological research, that’s three percent short of a large effect size.

Therefore, this research tells us that digital apps for depression can have a positive impact on depressive symptoms. Here’s how the researchers characterize their findings:

“The significant treatment efficacy of app-based interventions compared with active and inactive controls suggests the potential of mobile app interventions as an alternative to conventional psychotherapy, with further merits in accessibility, financial affordability, and safety from stigma.”

We’ll add that we see this research as a good reason to use apps in addition to standard psychotherapy for depression treatment, rather than instead of or as an alternative. For instance, if scheduling problems or life events mean a patient needs to reschedule an appointment, they can use an app to help them manage their depressive symptoms until their next appointment.

In that way, a depression treatment app can augment a standard treatment plan that may include psychotherapy, medication, lifestyle changes, peer support, and complementary therapies like mindfulness.