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Healthy Mind

Healthy Mind is an easy read website designed to to help adults (18+ years of age) with intellectual disability to improve their mental health.
It contains different sections designed to help with: recognising feelings; breathing and relaxing; taming anger; having more fun and managing unhelpful thinking.

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Healthy Mind	By Black Dog Institute
	Features Simple, step-by-step guide. Relatable images. Audio function for all content. Video content with subtitles. Printable worksheets and progress sheets. Emergency contacts for Australia and New Zealand and a list of other helpful contacts.
Country of origin	Australia
Clinical review	Read a clinical review below
Security and privacy	Does the app: Collect medical information? No Require a login? No Have password protection? No Have a privacy policy? Yes Require internet access to use? Yes Read more about safety and security when using apps. Brochures: Tips to improve your privacy and security [PDF, 65 KB] Healthify He Puna Waiora, NZ Staying safe online(external link) Netsafe, NZ
Cost	Free
Advertisements	This app contains no ads.
How to access the tool	(external link) Note: This is not to be confused with the Healthy Minds Programme App

Healthy Mind is an easy read website for people with mild to borderline intellectual disability to help build good mental health. It helps people to recognise and regulate their thoughts and feelings and helps to facilitate conversations about mental health in a safe way.

Healthy Mind consists of 5 interactive learning topics:

Recognising feelings has information about noticing your feelings and talking about your feelings.
Breathe and relax has information on how to relax your breathing and relax your body.
Taming anger has tips on how to calm your anger and talking when you feel angry.
Having more fun has tips on enjoyable activities and planning activities.
Tackling unhelpful thinking has guidance on managing unhelpful thoughts and focusing on helpful thoughts.

For each topic, you can learn about it, watch a video (with subtitles) about it and practice what you've learned ('do it'). These parts can be completed individually and can be accessed in any order. The time taken to complete each part ranges from about 2 to 5 minutes. Additional optional resources include simple activity worksheets and a progress sheet for you to keep track of your progress and tick off topics you've completed. The entire programme is supported by an audio option, if you prefer to listen rather than read.

It's recommended that you use Healthy Mind in Chrome, Edge or Fire Fox. Healthy Mind is not fully supported in Internet Explorer.

For a complete description, go to the website Health Mind.(external link)

PROS	CONS
✔ Simple and easy to follow step by step guide. ✔ Interactive content and activities. ✔ Printable progress booklet and worksheets. ✔ Notification that it's not a crisis service but has emergency contact details.	✘ None.

PROS

CONS

✔ Simple and easy to follow step by step guide.

✔ Interactive content and activities.

✔ Printable progress booklet and worksheets.

✔ Notification that it's not a crisis service but has emergency contact details.

✘ None.

Clinical review

Reviewer: Frances King, RCpN, PGDipHSc, Tuturu Consultancy, Tairawhiti
Date of review: August 2024
Platform reviewed: Online website
Version: 2019
Comments: Healthy Mind is a nice simple online tool for young people with mild to borderline intellectual disability, who may also be experiencing mild to moderate depression, anxiety and/or stress. It helps them to recognise and regulate their thoughts and feelings, giving some simple strategies to practice and tackle unhelpful thoughts. It also includes learning, planning and practicing enjoyable activities with an ability to download and print a progress booklet and activity worksheets.

This site has 5 interactive learning topics:

Recognising feelings has information about noticing your feelings and talking about your feelings.
Breathe and relax has information on how to relax your breathing and relax your body.
Taming anger has tips on how to calm your anger and talking when you feel angry.
Having more fun has tips on enjoyable activities and planning activities.
Tackling unhelpful thinking has guidance on managing unhelpful thoughts and focusing on helpful thoughts.

It's in an easy to read and follow format using a step-by-step guide to learn about it, watch it and do it. The sessions have rewards at the end of each activity. There is also a Healthy Mind Progress Booklet that can be downloaded with a checklist that you can fill in as you work through each of the topics. Also, each of the activities is supported by a downloadable worksheet that can be printed off for you to practice the things that you learn when you are away from the computer.
Safety concerns: None.
New Zealand relevance: Yes – relevant to a New Zealand audience and includes emergency contacts for Aotearoa New Zealand.

Watfern C, Heck C, Rule C, et al. Feasibility and acceptability of a mental health website for adults with an intellectual disability – qualitative evaluation JMIR Ment Health 2019;6(3):e12958
Healthy Mind(external link) Black Dog Institute, Australia
Healthy Mind –product information and terms of use(external link) Black Dog Institute, Australia

Disclaimer: The NZ Health App Library is a free consumer service to help you decide whether a health app would be suitable for you. Our review process is independent. We have no relationship with the app developers or companies and no responsibility for the service they provide. This means that if you have an issue with one of the apps we have reviewed, you will need to contact the app developer or company directly.