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Background Objective Method Results Conclusions Youth mental health (YMH) services have been established internationally to provide timely, age‐appropriate, mental health treatment and improve long‐term outcomes. However, YMH services face challenges including long waiting times, limited continuity of care, and time‐bound support. To bridge this gap, MOST was developed as a scalable, blended, multi‐modal digital platform integrating real‐time and asynchronous clinician‐delivered counselling; interactive psychotherapeutic content; vocational support; peer support, and a youth‐focused online community. The implementation of MOST within Australian YMH services has been publicly funded.The primary aim of this study was to evaluate the real‐world engagement, outcomes, and experience of MOST during the first 32 months of implementation.Young people from participating YMH services were referred into MOST. Engagement metrics were derived from platform usage. Symptom and satisfaction measures were collected at baseline, 6, and 12 (primary endpoint) weeks. Effect sizes were calculated for the primary outcomes of depression and anxiety and secondary outcomes of psychological distress and wellbeing.Five thousand seven hundred and two young people from 262 clinics signed up and used MOST at least once. Young people had an average of 19 login sessions totalling 129 min over the first 12 weeks of use, with 71.7% using MOST for at least 14 days, 40.1% for 12 weeks, and 18.8% for 24 weeks. There was a statistically significant, moderate improvement in depression and anxiety at 12 weeks as measured by the PHQ4 across all users irrespective of treatment stage (d = 0.41, 95% CI 0.35–0.46). Satisfaction levels were high, with 93% recommending MOST to a friend. One thousand one hundred and eighteen young people provided written feedback, of which 68% was positive and 31% suggested improvement.MOST is a highly promising blended digital intervention with potential to address the limitations and enhance the impact of YMH services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Online searches about anxiety and depression are recorded every 3-5 s. As such, information and communication technologies (ICT) have enormous potential to enable or impair help-seeking and patient-professional interactions. Youth studies indicate that ICT searches are undertaken before initial mental health consultations, but no publications have considered how this online activity affects the first steps of the patient journey in youth mental health settings., Methods: State-of-the-art review using an iterative, evidence mapping approach to identify key literature and expert consensus to synthesize and prioritise clinical and research issues., Results: Adolescents and young adults are more likely to seek health advice via online search engines or social media platforms than from a health professional. Young people not only search user-generated content and social media to obtain advice and support from online communities but increasingly contribute personal information online., Conclusions: A major clinical challenge is to raise professional awareness of the likely impact of this activity on mental health consultations. Potential strategies range from modifying the structure of clinical consultations to ensure young people are able to disclose ICT activities related to mental health, through to the development and implementation of 'internet prescriptions' and a youth-focused 'toolkit'., (© 2021 John Wiley & Sons A/S. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)