Most therapists are perpetually slammed, in part due to the pandemic-era surge in demand for mental healthcare. Everybody's full. Everybody's busy. Everybody's referring out, says Santa Clara University psychologist and ethicist Thomas Plante.
With the demand for care outpacing supply, mental health support bots like Wysa, Woebot, and Youper have been deployed to fill the gap. Regulations are lenient, allowing for their widespread use without FDA approval.
Wysa, an AI therapy chatbot, launched in 2016 and was one of the first in the market. The rise in popularity of these bots is driven by their affordability, accessibility, and the growing need for mental health support.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) does not require approval for standard AI therapy bots as long as they do not claim to replace human therapists. This flexibility has led to an increase in the availability and use of AI mental health tools.
#ai-therapy-chatbots #mental-health-support #shortage-of-human-providers #fda-regulations #demand-vs-supply
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