For Mentally Ill, a Rare Educational Resource Emerges

For the many Bay Area residents afflicted with mental health illnesses, it can be hard enough to manage taking pills, let alone to learn about the root cause their problem.

That's where Anjna Patient Education comes in.

Anjna is a non-profit Stanford startup targeting free health clinics that aims to provide education to underserved patients. They recently launched a funding campaign to create their first educational booth at the Schuman-Liles Mental Health Clinic in Oakland, CA.

According to , the problem with free clinics like Schuman-Liles is the lack of health education among patients.

“We work with [the clinic's] director, and she’s really excited about having all this information available because the big problem with clinics is that patients don’t even know what depression is or [what] bipolar disorder means, they’re just dependent upon the medication,” Singal said. “This is a way for them to become more aware of their disease so they can make proper decisions about it.”

To promote health education, Anjna partnered with Project Not Alone and Start Some Good in its campaign to raise funds for printed health education material, laptops and iPads. The interactive video modules available on the iPads will assist patients in understanding their illness by presenting the information in a kiosk fashion.

“The function of the iPad kiosk will be to provide [health education] in a different format that is more accessible, because it’s interactive,” Singal said.

Although science has not yet proven the effectiveness of interactive modules, research shows that online educational resources can be useful.

“Interactive online education shows promise, but has not been attempted in free clinic environments beyond a few exploratory studies,” Interactive Modules Director Megan Winkelman said. “These studies show that using interactive online learning modules in low-income environments is a highly effective education tool.”

In addition to iPad modules, Anjna has developed an online education database that contains easy to understand information for patients, as well as the SMS project, which provides direct, immediate communication between patients and health promoters.

This is all part of Anjna's larger effort to use technology as a means to better engage patients in their health education.

“Hopefully, [this technology] is going to be more interactive and more engaging,” Advisory Board Member Joseph Pineda said. “You have to make it fun and interesting for people. You can’t just give them a booklet or they’re not going to care.”