An Evidence-Based App to Help MS Patients with Depression

Pear Therapeutics is known for producing the first smartphone app to be FDA-approved for the treating of medical conditions. They received FDA approval for doctor-prescribed apps to treat substance abuse disorder and opioid use disorder, and are on track to producing clinical applications that can help treat a number of other conditions.

Echobind leveraged several of their senior engineers to help the Pear Therapeutics team research, develop and publish their app, simply named “Pear 006”, whose goal is to treat depression in Multiple Sclerosis patients.

The App’s Purpose

Depression is a common symptom for multiple sclerosis patients, who have their own set of concerns, worries and biological symptoms. The depression symptoms associated with MS are known to be very manageable with the help of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), a widely-used treatment methodology in which patients make note of their automatic negative thoughts, and replace them with more constructive ones.

The Pear 006 app took the form of a chatbot that would help a patient form the habit of assessing negative thoughts and turning them into more constructive ones. Each iteration of the app was validated with patients to ensure it was going to be maximally helpful to them.

Our Solution

Our process with the Pear team involved regular assessments of goals for both the company and the end users, combined with evaluations of feature development possibilities. For the CBT chatbot, we conducted a comparative analysis of existing frameworks like Microsoft Bot Framework, Rasa, and Google’s DialogFlow, carefully weighing the pros and cons of each through the lens of client concerns and making informed recommendations.

Echobind leveraged its expertise in AI to create a custom chatbot for Pear 006, designed to support MS patients with depression. By developing a proprietary chatbot "brain" that efficiently managed patient interactions through guided pathways, Echobind ensured minimal developer intervention while allowing Pear's mental health experts to fine-tune content. This bespoke solution not only streamlined DevOps overhead but also provided a scalable platform for future AI enhancements, demonstrating Echobind's capability to integrate advanced technology in healthcare applications.

Ultimately, the right solution was different than expected: the Echobind team built a custom chatbot “brain” that was contained within the app, directing the patient through different chat threads based on their input. Each conversational thread was completely administered by the Pear 006 expert team via a sophisticated yet stable spreadsheet interface. This design ensured the chatbot brain could be easily replaced if needed.

In short, Pear was able to continually refine and improve the chatbot’s patient interactions with minimal developer involvement.