WellHappy

The last month or so has been pretty hectic, they were always going to be with the restructure of the NHS and the VIK project at YoungMinds coming to an end after four years.

But in the last few weeks i have managed to get a lot done!

After launching the app first at the Healthcare Innovation Expo and then at City Hall i had a few days to finally relax and then bounced right back into work mode.

Launching the WellHappy app

I attended an iBehave meetup at Google Campus around using tech to increase condom usage in young men. Devika, the winner of the SexFactor2012 awards, came with me and together we worked together with a team of other people from tech, third sector and health backgrounds to come up with solutions. As someone who is much more familiar with the mental health side of the app we developed (plug: download here!) it was good to have an expert and friend with me.

You can watch a short video made about the event here.

I also made a short film for YouthNet and TheSite about mental health and employment. I’ve seen a sneak peek but i’m afraid it has not been released just yet. When it is i will post it so watch this space.

And two last little things i thought i would mention..

Firstly my app was featured in the Guardian today after they interviewed me recently. You can read it here.

Secondly, more for those in London, the WellHappy app will also be featured in the Evening Standard on Thursday so make sure to look out for it!

My WellHappy app launches at Expo

Myhealthlondon attend the Healthcare Innovation Expo

On March 13th and 14th 2013 members of the myhealthlondon team attended the Healthcare Innovation Expo at the Excel Centre in London. We were there to highlight our website, our dementia community and to launch the WellHappy app for young Londoners.

It was also a great opportunity to find out what else is happening in healthcare at the moment and we met lots of interesting new people including service users, clinicians and commissioners. We also bumped into Lord Victor Abedowale, the Chief Executive of Turning Point and had a chat about WellHappy and how some of Turning Point’s services for young people are included.

 

The Appzone and Health Apps Library

One of the main attractions at the Expo was the Appzone which you can see in the pictures below. It was here that the Health Apps Library was launched by the NHS Commissioning Board.

Over the two days of the expo ten brand new, never-before-seen apps were launched including our own.

It was a great opportunity not just in terms of the amazing platform to launch our own app but also to meet other developers, designers and teams involved in app development. We shared a lot of learning on the day and have had lots of interesting conversations since, showing that what happens at Expo doesn’t have to stay there, especially not with the invention of Twitter! It’s great to see so many clinicians embracing social media and using it to help their patients and provide information and insight into the medical world.

You can find out more about the App Zone and Health Apps Library by visiting the site here or by following @healthappslib on Twitter

 

Launching the WellHappy app

 

Kat Cormack, project manager, and Bruce Kynoch, Assistant Stakeholder and Marketing Manager launch the app.

Bruce and I gave a short presentation to the audience in the Appzone to officially launch the WellHappy app. This involved talking about the app, where it came from, whose ideas went into it, who helped us develop it and what it was like working on a project of this kind.

We also gave a quick demonstration to the audience on how to use the app and encouraged people to download it from Google Play or the Apple App Store.

Joining us were colleagues from LivingWell, BrightLemon and Digital White, our design and development companies who have been so integral to the making and launching of the WellHappy app. It was great to have their support on the day and to have them around to answer any technical questions people might have.

People also had a chance to try out the app on tablets at the event and give us feedback right there and then. It was great to see people trying out the app, searching for services near them and then going to download it on their own phones! All the feedback we got was incredibly positive and it was good to hear clinicians say how useful even they would find an app like ours!

It just shows that WellHappy can be used by anyone, you don’t need to be a young person to find the information in it useful and if you work with young people, whether you are a youth worker, doctor, nurse or a teacher in London it is worth a look.

 

The Kat returns after quite an absence

Hello dear readers,

I must firstly apologise from what feels like a very lengthy absence from the blogosphere for me, it was certainly not intentional but as it turned out quite unavoidable.

Those who have been paying attention will know that since August last year i have been working for YoungMinds and NHS London’s My Health London to produce an app and website for young people in the capital.

After a few false starts and issues at the beginning we are now working at full pace and racing towards a release date which has been set as mid-March..not leaving much time to get everything ready for launch.

We have developers, designers and young people working closely together to produce something that we hope will answer point five of the State of Mind manifesto and help young people find help when they need it most.

I will be releasing sneek peaks over the next few months as we get closer to launch so:

1. Watch this space

2. Follow me on Twitter at @KittyCormack

We will also be launching a website next month and i can’t wait for you all to see it.

50 Shades of Grey to be used as toilet paper

Back in August i wrote a blog, which you can read here. The blog was about my reactions to the intense press coverage of rape stories; triggered mainly by comments made by male politicians such as Todd Aikin in the US and George Galloway here in the UK.

One of the things that i spoke about was my unease around the bestselling 50 Shades of Grey and in particular how hard i found it to deal with that every morning on my commute the trains were full of people either reading these rape headlines or Shades of Grey. I found it a disturbing juxtaposition.

I am certainly not the only one that draws issue with the book in question and the messages it sends out. Speaking to friends, including several with experiences of domestic violence and refuges, i found plenty of other people that are just as troubled by this.

So it was very interesting to hear that a refuge in England has had a really great idea that doesn’t involve book burning but instead..and wait for this..using 50 Shades of Grey as toilet paper!

Wearside Women in Need have started a campaign; “Fifty Shades of Abuse” and have been asking for donations of the book which will be cut up and used as toilet paper and compost.

50 Shades of Abuse

Read the whole article here: Domestic abuse charity to use 50 Shades of Grey as toilet paper.