SINGAPORE – Because the pandemic dragged into its second 12 months, socially distanced Singaporeans sought tech options to enhance their psychological well being and well-being – and tech builders responded.
Worldwide, psychological well being and wellness weighed on folks’s minds. Google searches for tactics to take care of psychological well being, and for optimistic affirmations – equivalent to “I’m worthy and I’m liked” – reached an all-time excessive amongst English-speaking international locations, in response to the search engine’s 2021 traits report.
Netflix and meditation app Headspace partnered to supply video guides on meditation, sleeping and rest by way of the streaming platform this 12 months.
Amid the worldwide deal with well- being, Singapore stood out because the world’s most exhausted nation, in response to British bedding producer Sleepseeker’s analysis, launched in July.
The rankings within the research had been derived from evaluating sleep instances; time spent on the Web; working hours and searches for sleep-related issues.
Responding to the deep want right here for relaxation and restoration, extra apps and tech platforms got here on-line to attach customers to human therapists or AI counsellors, or to supply guided meditation and rest workshops. Employers signed on for tech platforms to help their workers. Others piloted their very own programmes with builders.
Mind, a Singapore-based psychological well being app, was adopted by supply platform foodpanda to offer help to workers (excluding supply riders).
MindFi, a wellness and psychological well being app began by Singaporean entrepreneur Bjorn Lee in 2017, this 12 months secured US$750,000 in funding from angel traders to assist with product growth and localisation in Asian markets. MindFi presently serves greater than 30 company purchasers and is rolling out help in several Asian languages, together with Malay.
Mr Lee says: “I needed to vary how psychological well being was perceived, beginning with Asia due to the stigma there round psychological well being points.”
Builders and customers say apps and tech options for psychological well being are good for Singapore, the place there’s nonetheless disgrace round looking for assist.
Apps present anonymity, however employers can customise the information gathered for insights to enhance human useful resource administration.
The Authorities’s Internet app mindline.sg, arrange final 12 months, was augmented in October with a piece model. This new useful resource was developed to assist public officers with office stressors and is accessible to the final workforce.
It was developed by the Ministry of Well being’s MOH Workplace for Healthcare Transformation and the Public Service, which is Singapore’s largest employer. The mindline at work Internet app features a clinically validated well-being self-assessment software and an emotionally clever chatbot, Wysa.