Episode 2 of the Silicon Roundabout Podcast features Laura Stembridge, a mental health advocate behind the startup InsideOut. Laura has graduate degrees in physical sports and mental health. She built the company after herself going through a dark period in her life. She remembers being appalled by suicide statistics, the general lack of understanding about mental health, and the inaccessibility of resources that do exist and that can help people cope with their mental health issues.
And so, InsideOut is a mobile app that offers access to preventative health care and early intervention. Preventative health care consists of personalised mental assessments and workouts for the mind, to keep it in tip-top shape. Early intervention features online video therapy sessions. Laura formed the idea for Inside Out when she experienced some post traumatic issues. When she sought help and support for this, she found that people around her had no idea how to provide it.
Laura laments that even now, mental health still gets a lot of lip service from people who do not appreciate its importance and fail to understand its impact on health and living. But she is confident that there is a promising enough market to create a significant demand for the app. “Tele-medicine at the moment is in its infancy… and yet it’s an 80 billion global market,” she explains.
“We don’t need people just talking about it. We need people to start taking action.”