With the ever growing concerns of depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues amongst the students in higher education, the 21st century has brought about a more innovative means of safeguarding and ensuring a healthy state of mind for the students. Taking advantage of this groundbreaking innovation, city based Parul University, took the initiative of establishing relations with “Yourdost”, an online clinical psychotherapy platform for the benefit of the students. Parul University on the 17th of March 2019 signed an MoU with this Bangalore based mental health startup, for it to act as a confidant for the students, by availing some of its most vital services, including anonymous counseling sessions from expert professional psychologists.
Founded by Richa Singh an IIT Guwahati alumnus, Yourdost is an online emotional support system where people suffering from emotional stress amongst other mental health related issues can avail counseling services from various experts. The process which the users undergo will be anonymous, in other words their identities will always remain confidential for their own safety. The success of this ever growing initiative is seen through the outstanding impact which it has made from the time of its inception, by managing to stop over 70 000 people from committing suicide. The ever growing pressures of the professional and student based lifestyles have left a large number of people in states of mental illness. Therefore Yourdost provides this personalised, client friendly platform which is easily accessible to anyone at the click of a button.
Upon realising that many students suffering from stress related problems do not like approaching a psychologist, Yourdost brings the psychologist to the student. The initiative Parul University has taken will provide for its students, a free access to this service, with a full 24 hour service. As part of the understanding signed between the two parties, Richa Singh conducted a series of workshops all across the campus hostels, initiating this program amongst the students, as well educating them about the need and importance of taking their mental health in high regard. She also advised the students to always make use of these services as a positive step towards a healthy state of mind. One of the major points of highlight were concerning some basic symptoms for self diagnosis. The students have expressed a great appreciation for this service and it has witnessed the widest use during their examination period as a way of reducing their anxiety.
“We are living in an era of social media and other digital networks and our students are widely exposed to these various elements in their surrounding environments. Such an exposure coupled with the pressures of their academics puts their mental health at risk. Therefore keeping this in mind, I believe a digital platform such as Yourdost will be an essential way of providing an efficient digital service for the students. Also to note is how many of the students fear approaching any Psychologists, therefore a platform such as this will go a long way in filling this gap, by bringing the psychologist to the students, said Dr Geetika M Patel, the University’s Medical Director.
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