Improving mental health

The technology issue of Contemporary Pediatrics, September 2024, highlights 3 articles using digital technology to help pediatric and adolescent populations better manage their own care. A review article titled, Background on digital therapeutics and what they can do for mental health,¹ highlights research conducted by J. Khan, PhD, who is the co-founder of Mightier digital therapeutics. The “Mightier” enables children and adolescents with mental health concerns to improve their emotional health using video game interactions that help children and adolescents learn to control their symptoms by receiving feedback about managing the emotions in the video interaction.

Mightier was tested in a randomized controlled trial (NCT01551732) which showed that the Mightier treatment led to a larger improvement in the child/adolescent’s management of aggression. Further research is needed to continue to test the Mightier digital technology model in the care of children who are waiting to receive mental health referrals and/or who are in mental health care.

Managing obesity

An article titled, Digital health programs and child health childhood obesity,² highlights digital tools such, as health apps, texts and telemedicine in managing childhood obesity. The programs described in this article focused on telemedicine, text messaging, and digital therapeutics, which were reported as promising in the support of weight management in the pediatric/adolescents’ populations. Obesity is a major concern in the pediatric populations and has a major behavioral component.

Because of this, digital technology that contains weight management from a behavioral health management perspective are needed to enable children to develop eating and physical activities that support growth within the expected growth curve. Future research studies are needed to investigate the effectiveness of these digital technologies for all pediatric populations including under-represented populations. In my opinion, equally as important are the development of apps for parents to manage feeding habits in the first 3-years of life, as this may be a major key to the prevention of childhood obesity.

Children with medical complexity

Another article, authored by Dr. Muenzer,³ discusses better ways to care for the pediatric populations who have medically complex conditions such as cleft palate and/or cardiac conditions. Dr. Muenzer and his team also developed apps to inform practitioners in real time about the care or feeding of a child with these conditions. Because of this, the needs of these children could be met immediately by having practitioners provide information to parents on how to care for the children at a specific moment in time.³

The future of health care in a digital world and artificial intelligence

Each of these articles describe digital technology use in health care for pediatric populations and their parents offer real promise to change outcomes for children with mental health conditions, for managing children with obesity, and for helping parents care for their medically complex child in real time in their homes. The future of health care is exciting, requires thoughtful reflection upon the current management of patients and how digital technologies can complement the overall care management for children/adolescents with these and most likely many other medical conditions.

Another area in technology, that is currently expanding at an enormously rapid speed, is the use of artificial intelligence, referred to as AI. The future of health care is evolving rapidly and will require new and innovative educational strategies that prepare health care professionals to meet the challenges of incorporating AI safely and effectively within the health care management of patients. What will the new role of physicians, nurse practitioners, and all health care professionals become as AI continues to rapidly evolve, expand, and effect day-to-day changes in health care delivery.

To be on and remain on the forefront of these rapid AI changes, nurse practitioners must consider how to incorporate this information into current educational programs, how to educate NPs currently in practice, and make a commitment to maintain high standards in the delivery of patient care to assure that the decision making is guided by critical thinking in all clinical practice encounters.

References:

1. Fitch J. Background on digital therapeutics and what they can do for mental health. Contemporary Pediatrics, 2024;40(8);20-22.

2. Fitch J. Digital health programs and childhood obesity. Contemporary Pediatrics, 2024,40(8);28.

3. Muenzwer JT. Tackling clinical workforce challenges through innovative and effective leadership. 2024,40(8); 25-26.