ICTs for Wellbeing and Happiness special track: The role of ICTs in Mental Health Prevention and Treatment
WSIS
Session 537
Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It can affect daily living, relationships, and physical health. Mental health is, therefore, important at every stage of life, from childhood and adolescence through adulthood. Also, in recent years, there has been increasing acknowledgment of the important role mental health plays in achieving global development goals, as illustrated by the inclusion of mental health in the Sustainable Development Goals.
ICTs and e-health represent an important opportunity for mental health, both in the prevention of mental health illnesses and their treatment. Interestingly, this goes in line with the increasing acknowledgment of the important role mental health plays in achieving global development goals, as illustrated by the inclusion of mental health in the SDGs. The psychological help offered by e-Health offers a large number of benefits, including increased accessibility and flexibility, the ability to implement new delivery methods, as well as a decrease in the stigma often associated with getting help. However, even if e-Health has the power to promote both physical and mental well-being, many barriers still exist to the full realization of digital health and healthcare’s benefits, including challenges related to low digital literacy or safety and privacy issues, as well as the limitations of ICT-based psychological services for mental health promotion, prevention, and treatment.
The aim of this session is to discuss and share information on the prevention and treatment of mental health using ICTs. The online thematic workshop will be conducted as a panel discussion, with one moderator that will facilitate the discussion. The speakers will answer questions and share their views based on their knowledge and personal experience in the field. In addition, some time will be left for Q&A.
Tatyana Kanzaveli has gone from a programmer to senior executive at Big 5 to founder and CEO of a startup company along her 20-year career, recognized as a thought leader, mentor for her ability to guide Fortune 500 and startup companies through business challenges.
She’s worked for major companies like PricewaterhouseCoopers and Fujitsu and startups in the early days of the Web.
Tatyana has personally helped companies jump from 0 to millions in revenue even during the toughest economic times. She opened new verticals and markets.
Today she is the founder and CEO of Open Health Network, the startup in a Big Data, Blockchain, and Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare space. PatientSphere by Open Health Network has been featured in Venture Beat, Mobile Health News, and other prominent publications.
She is a mentor at 500Startups and Richard Branson Entrepreneurs Centre and serves on boards for private companies. She also is a licensee and organizer of highly notable TEDxBayArea conferences, she is a frequent speaker at US and International conferences on innovation, entrepreneurship, and digital health.
Tatyana has been featured in the White House blog, spoke at the United Nations, presented at the first White House Demo Day hosted by President Obama, did a TEDx talk; keynoted at WEBIT, WSIS, and other international conferences.
Tatyana has been recognized as one of the top 10 Influential Women in Healthcare IT in 2015 and by Forbes as one of the top 50 women-led startups in tech founders.
Professor Grobler qualified as a medical doctor in 1989 at the University of Pretoria. His postgraduate qualifications include a Diploma in Occupational Health, an MMed in Psychiatry, cum laude, a Fellowship of the Colleges of Psychiatrists, and a Doctorate in Medicine on the topic of bipolar mood disorder. Presently he is Extraordinary Professor at the University of Pretoria, School of Public Health and Associate Professor at the Walter Sisulu University. He has published extensively, most notably in the field of workplace stress and disability, and presented both nationally and internationally. His special interest lies in the field of corporate mental health education, prevention of disability due to common mental health disorders, and psychiatric impairment assessment. He is also a qualified Psychodynamic-systemic Group Leadership Coach.
Luma is an education professional with a psychology background who is passionate about creating positive social impact through scalable tech-enabled projects. She is the co-founder and director of Elggo, a Dubai-based health and ed-tech platform that offers K-12 MENA schools a culturally compatible AI-powered digital evidence-based mental health and social-emotional learning program in Arabic and English.
Luma has also worked in the tech for social good humanitarian ecosystem, where past projects she has founded matched 5,000 coders in the Levant to remote work, building a school for 300 migrants in Beirut, and leading humanitarian relief aid efforts to support 4,500 individuals following the Beirut Explosion.
Tom Osborn is the Co-Founder and CEO of Shamiri Institute, a data-driven public benefit organization that develops and scales mental healthcare to young people across Africa and especially Kenya. Tom is a TED Fellow—given to doers who have shown unusual accomplishment, exceptional courage, and are creating positive change around the world—and a global Forbes’ 30 under 30 social entrepreneur.
Globally, Tom has developed a reputation as a community mobilizer, social entrepreneur, and global mental health innovator. At 18, he co-founded GreenChar, a social enterprise which provided 3,000 homes and institutions in rural Kenyan and urban slums with clean energy. For his trailblazing work in the clean energy sector with GreenChar, Tom became the youngest recipient of the Echoing Green Fellowship – an award given to the leading emerging social entrepreneurs around the world. He has also other numerous national and international awards for his community-oriented entrepreneurship, including World Deliver Social Entrepreneur of the year in 2016, the Donors’ Circle for Africa Energy Prize and many others. Africa Youth Awards named him as one of the 100 Most Influential Young
Africans.
Tom was born and raised in poverty in rural Kenya. His education was only possible because of $300,000 in academic scholarships and grants. He graduated from Harvard University with a Bachelor’s in Psychology (High Honors) with a secondary in Computer Science.
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C3. Access to information and knowledge
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C4. Capacity building
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C5. Building confidence and security in use of ICTs
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C7. ICT applications: benefits in all aspects of life — E-science
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C10. Ethical dimensions of the Information Society
The project is in line with the following ALs and SDGs:
SDGs:
SDG 1: End poverty in all its forms everywhere
SDG 3: Good healh and well-being
SDG 4: Quality education
WSIS ALs:
WSIS Action Line 3: Access to information and knowledge
WSIS Action Line 4: Capacity Building
WSIS Action Line 5: Building confidence and security in the use of ICTs
WSIS Action Line 7: ICTs Applications in all aspects of life – e-health
WSIS Action Line 10: Ethical Dimension of the Information Society
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Goal 1: End poverty in all its forms everywhere
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Goal 3: Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all
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Goal 4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all
Scaling up and accelerating the management of mental illness is essential to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of ensuring healthy lives and well-being for all at every age by 2030.