Enabling transdisciplinary collaboration in design and mental health: Engaging researchers, services, and end-users as partners through co-design

Increasingly, eHealth solutions are designed and developed using transdisciplinary methodologies that bring together researchers, service providers and end users as partners in the technology design process (Hagen et al. 2012). Participatory Design and co-design methods have been widely applied in the contexts of evidence-based eHealth and mHealth applications and have been shown to be effective in facilitating a greater relevance and acceptance of the final digital solution by end users. Indeed, user-centric innovation methods in eHealth are highlighted as a key strategy in Queensland’s eHealth strategic investment policy (2016-2026). However, few case studies present the methodological and operational challenges of undertaking applied transdisciplinary research spanning the fields of design research and mental health. This paper presents the process and preliminary outcomes of a nationally funded applied research project to design, develop and evaluate a youth mobile help-seeking app involving a multi-disciplinary team from design research, psychology, youth counselling, and young people as representatives of the target user group, in collaboration with a national youth counselling service provider