Digital Therapy App Improves Mental Health of College Students

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By Lori Solomon HealthDay Reporter

Medically reviewed by Carmen Pope, Senior Medical Editor, B. Pharm. Last updated on May 12, 2026.

via HealthDay

TUESDAY, May 12, 2026 -- A smartphone app with cognitive-behavioral therapy-guided self-help (D-CBTgsh) helps college students with common mental health issues, according to a study published online May 7 in Nature Human Behavior.

Michelle G. Newman, from Pennsylvania State University in University Park, and colleagues randomly assigned 6,205 college students with clinical levels or a high risk for anxiety, depression, and/or eating disorders based on college-level screening (39,194 assessed at 26 U.S. universities) to D-CBTgsh or referral to college-provided care groups.

The researchers found that screening+D-CBTgsh reduced prevalence of any mental disorder (primary outcome) at six weeks (odds ratio [OR], 0.80), six months (OR, 0.77), and two years (OR, 0.82). In the screening+D-CBTgsh group, services uptake was greater versus the screening+referral group (74.4 versus 30.2 percent) at six months (OR, 6.72) and two years (OR, 1.83), including for minoritized groups. Screening+D-CBTgsh was also associated with improvements in dimensional outcomes of generalized anxiety, social anxiety, depression, eating disorder symptoms, and mental health functioning.

"Many students wait until they reach a crisis point to reach out to the counseling center," senior author Ellen Fitzsimmons-Craft, Ph.D., from Washington University in St. Louis, said in a statement. "By pairing screening with immediate access to the app, students have an opportunity to take a more proactive approach to their mental health."

One author disclosed ties to the digital mental health provider industry.

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Disclaimer: Statistical data in medical articles provide general trends and do not pertain to individuals. Individual factors can vary greatly. Always seek personalized medical advice for individual healthcare decisions.

Source: HealthDay

Posted : 2026-05-13 02:44

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