The Importance of Early Diagnosis and Awareness in Mental Health

Depression numbers are alarming. Approximately 280 million people in the world suffer from it. It is the fourth leading cause of death in 15-29-year-olds, and over 700.000 lives are lost due to suicide every year. However, there is a long way to reaching the extreme end of the scale in mental diseases. This is where early diagnosis plays a key role.

Mediktor recognizes the importance of prompt diagnosis when it comes to mental health. The company increased its mental illness database by 32% during 2022, and is expected to grow further in 2023. As for depression specifically, Mediktor’s professional team has been working on improving its AI-based pre-diagnose to detect it since the first onset of symptoms. This can be reflected in numbers: within the total of Mediktor’s mental health illnesses, 5.4% received depression pre-diagnosis. Relevant data since the World Health Organization registered 3.8% of the population affected by depression.

Lack of awareness and overlooking symptoms could cause underdiagnosis around the world. It can be difficult for a patient to differentiate between usual mood fluctuations and a real depression case. The fact of the matter is not to play down the symptoms one may be struggling with. For example, thanks to Mediktor Natural Language Processing, users can type their own words to express themselves. Thus, a relevant group of people used the exact words “I feel sad” or “I can’t sleep”, and through NLP, Mediktor was able to understand them perfectly. After a set of AI-based questions, it was possible to differentiate between a sad, isolated day in people’s lives and a case of depression, asserting a more accurate, patient-oriented pre-diagnosis and triggering the proper attention before it progresses until a point of no return.

When talking about specific social groups affected by depression, Mediktor numbers have shown a prevalence of teenagers. According to the company database, most people pre-diagnosed with depression are between 15 and 30 years old, with a majority of women over men at 76%. Depression strikes directly into routine individuals’ lives. Functioning poorly at their jobs or school, keeping their distance from their beloved ones, and causing social isolation. All of these may cause a major impact during adolescence, one of the fundamental stages of human development.

The presented facts and numbers expose the need to take depression seriously, and Mediktor is up for it. The thousands of individuals online suffering can freely share with Mediktor how they are actually feeling. This is a new, revolutionary way of choosing empowerment over shame and stigma. Early, on-point diagnosis may be the start to raising awareness and preventing the progression of a disease affecting more people than we think.