AI vs Tele Mental Health Care Services: Digging Deeper Into The Buzzwords

FIT explains what the difference between AI and tele mental healthcare services is.

(Photo: iStock/Altered by FIT)

(This article is a part of 'AI Told You So', a special series by The Quint that explores how Artificial Intelligence is changing our present and how it stands to shape our future. Click here to view the full collection of stories in the series.)

There’s plenty of much chatter on the internet about AI-driven mental healthcare and tele mental healthcare services. With it also comes apprehension.

Can AI or digital tools replace therapists? Are there any limitations to how digital tools can be used when it comes to mental health? Are there privacy concerns involved? Can these digital tools be empathetic?

While all these questions are important, let's start with the basics - by differentiating between the two digital health tools.

FIT explains the difference between AI and tele mental healthcare services, and how to decide which one may be more suitable for you.

AI Vs Tele Mental Healthcare Services: What Exactly Are They?

AI-driven mental healthcare is an umbrella term. Within this broader term, there are many different aspects of how AI tools can be used to provide support. 

First, there are generative AI tools like chatbots that have been trained to talk to people and guide them through emotional wellness or therapy, whatever the algorithm analyses their need is. 

But AI tools are also deployed to develop algorithms, perform diagnoses, assessments, predictive models, screening tests for issues like anxiety and depression, etc.

They can also be used for user profiling through trackers and sensors, wherein they can identify symptoms and prescriptions for clients and use that knowledge to better guide other users.

"AI tools help you with precision engagement and precision treatment," Smriti Joshi, the chief psychologist at WYSA – a mental health app – tells FIT.

On the other hand, tele mental healthcare predominantly involves seeking therapy or emotional support from a mental health professional through a telephonic medium.

But it can also involve telepsychiatry, where a medical professional diagnoses and prescribes medications for a person over call. 

“Unlike AI, where there is no human intervention, tele mental healthcare encompasses an element of training. For instance, NIMHANS runs a programme where they train people to identify signs of addiction and how to provide basic treatment for them over call.”

Smriti Joshi, Chief psychologist, WYSA

Pros & Cons: To Each Their Own

While both these digital forms of mental healthcare services are relatively new, there are certain things that work in favour of them and against them as well.

What trumps AI over any other format of mental healthcare is that AI tools are available 24x7. If you need support at 1 pm or 4 am, AI chatbots are accessible to vent to and take the load off your mind. 

However, AI can only screen you for certain tests and not diagnose you. You’d also have to get your test results corroborated or reviewed by a medical professional.

"AI tools need clinicians reviewing it or feeding responses throughout and data sets that are empathetic, so that it can give you better advice and not trigger you."

Smriti Joshi, Chief Psychologist at WYSA

Dr Trideep Choudhury, Consultant Psychiatrist at Vasant Kunj's Fortis Hospital, on the other hand, tells FIT,

“For tele mental healthcare, the professional on the other end of the call can see the nuances, the changes in the voice, the tone, the language of the other person, and can come up with the diagnosis and protocols for treatment accordingly.”

He adds that in traditional setups, when the professional meets the patient, they can tell a lot of things about them from their body language, their behaviour, etc. This can be replicated to some level in tele mental healthcare services as well, but not with AI tools at this point.

Dr Choudhury feels that AI driven mental healthcare services are still in the nascent stages and need to be explored more deeply.

For the time being, he says that AI can help design cognitive exercises, assess programmes and tests, and help in a more managerial way.

“More research needs to be done. More data needs to be collected when it comes to AI.”

Dr Trideep Choudhury, Consultant Psychiatrist at Fortis Hospital

Accessibility & Affordability

Despite these many pros and cons, what works in favour of these digital tools is that they increase accessibility and make mental healthcare services more affordable for people. 

While a traditional therapy session might cost you anywhere from Rs 500-2,000 in urban India, most chatbots/apps are free, and tele sessions cost much less. 

Dr Samir Parikh, the Director of Department of Mental Health and Behavioral Sciences, Fortis Healthcare, Delhi, had said on The Quint’s The Big Story podcast, earlier this month, "Digital tools reduce stigma as people might not be okay going to a doctor but talking to a bot, or on the phone is easier.”

Not just that, digital tools also help bridge the accessibility gap since practically anyone with a phone can use them. 

“Sitting in NCR, the sheer number of people I see in rural areas through tele mental health services is a significant evolution for me. People from faraway areas can’t come to cities every time they need to see a psychiatrist, these tools help that way.”

Dr Samir Parikh, Director of Department of Mental Health and Behavioral Sciences, Fortis Healthcare

Where Digital Tools Don't Cut It

What also works for these tools is that they pass the baton to professional experts when the client's needs surpass what they can offer. 

For instance, Joshi says that, at WYSA, when it comes to sensitive issues like suicide, rape, trauma, or self-harm, they have not designed a generative AI tool. She says, "We don’t know what the bot will say in such scenarios. So, we have made a different pathway for that."

There is also the realisation that AI tools are not suitable for everyone, explains Joshi, especially for people who might be getting hallucinations, delusions, who are not self aware about their actions or tendencies, or those who maybe suicidal.

Joshi adds, "All crisis helplines are telephonic because talking helps more than texting, and takes less bandwidth as well. Vocal tones and signs of distress are easier to identify on call too."

This also seems necessary as the few guidelines when it comes to digitally-driven mental healthcare are vague as of now.