Storage of Digital Mental Health Data for Research: MindSpot Research Databank

The MindSpot Clinic (www.mindspot.org.au) is a national digital mental health service (DMHS) funded by the Australian Federal Government’s Department of Health and established in December 2012. MindSpot provides psychological information, assessment, and treatment to Australian adults with common mental health disorders, via the internet and telephone. Patients can access MindSpot directly via the website or be referred by their health professional. Patient data, including demographics, health information, and treatment outcomes, is routinely collected by MindSpot in accordance with Australian Privacy Principles for highly sensitive health information. The primary purpose of the MindSpot Research Databank is to allow data that is gathered as part of the routine operations of MindSpot to be stored in deidentified format for research purposes. People register with MindSpot by creating an account and completing a screening assessment, online or by telephone. The screening assessment includes questions on demographics, previous health service use information, symptoms, and current stressors. It takes about 20 minutes to complete. Participants who complete an assessment may then elect to enrol in a MindSpot digital treatment course, which consists of 5 online lessons delivered over 8 weeks. Or they may enrol for Teletherapy, which consists of approximately 4-5 sessions of therapy delivered via the telephone. For all treatment options, treatment engagement is monitored, and standardised symptom measures are administered to allow symptom improvements to be measured. The primary symptom measure is the K-10, which is a 10-item measure of psychological distress. Treatment outcomes are measures at the start of treatment, mid-treatment, post-treatment, and at 3-month follow-up. Participants who enrolled in treatment will only be followed up for 3 months post-program participation however they will be asked to consent to their data being used for future analyses, noting that no new data will be requested for these analyses. Participants who participate in the assessment only (i.e., do not participate in any treatments offered by MindSpot), the duration of observation ends at this point (i.e., once-off participation).