MHCC Assessed Mental Health Apps Collection
As part of its commitment to advancing digital mental health care, the Mental Health Commission of Canada (MHCC) launched Canada’s first Assessment Framework for Mental Health Apps in 2023. Funded by Health Canada and in collaboration with the Organisation for the Review of Care and Health Apps (ORCHA), this national framework sets rigorous standards for safety, quality, and effectiveness in mental health apps.
The framework evaluates apps across seven key areas: data and privacy; clinical evidence; clinical safety; usability and accessibility; security and technical stability; cultural safety, social responsibility, and equity; and enhanced data sovereignty. What makes this framework uniquely Canadian is its emphasis on cultural safety, social responsibility, equity, and enhanced data protection, ensuring that digital tools are inclusive and respectful of diverse peoples, including Indigenous communities.
The apps listed below have been assessed using this framework and have received the MHCC badge, indicating they meet the high standards for digital mental health support. This collection is regularly updated to reflect apps’ ongoing ability to maintain certification requirements. Some of these apps have also been recognized by Newfoundland and Labrador and included in their provincial mental health app library. This initiative is part of a broader strategy to improve access to safe and effective e-mental health tools across Canada.
The ACHWM app is a tablet-based survey that provides Indigenous communities and organizations with an overview of the health and well-being of children. The measure offers insight into children’s spiritual, emotional, physical, and mental wellness.
The survey is completed on a tablet that engages children and acts as a catalyst for honest conversation. The results are shared with each child or youth in a visual form on the Balance Chart.
The data obtained from the survey can be used for many purposes, including identifying areas where more services are needed and supporting advocacy for program funding.
Once a child has completed the ACHWM, an individual report is automatically generated and available to local health workers to summarize their wellness scores and flag any concerning answers that require immediate follow-up.
The ACHWM app is a tablet-based survey that provides Indigenous communities and organizations with an overview of the health and well-being of children. The measure offers insight into children’s spiritual, emotional, physical, and mental wellness.
The survey is completed on a tablet that engages children and acts as a catalyst for honest conversation. The results are shared with each child or youth in a visual form on the Balance Chart.
The data obtained from the survey can be used for many purposes, including identifying areas where more services are needed and supporting advocacy for program funding.
Once a child has completed the ACHWM, an individual report is automatically generated and available to local health workers to summarize their wellness scores and flag any concerning answers that require immediate follow-up.
Focus: Substance use
Breaking Free from Substance Use is an evidence-based digital behaviour change program that allows people to recognize and actively address the psychological and lifestyle issues that are driving their use of alcohol and/or drugs, helping to support their recovery.
Based on cognitive-behavioural therapy, mindfulness, and other proven therapeutic approaches, the program gives people a comprehensive toolkit of resources, positive coping strategies, and behaviour change techniques to support their long-term recovery.
Focus: General well-being, mindfulness
Breathr is a mindfulness-based app offering people a variety of practices, from guided meditations to simple practices that can be used anywhere by youth, parents, caregivers, and health professionals.
Focus: Suicide prevention
The Embracing Life app focuses on suicide prevention, offering guidance on how to help others and yourself. Users are walked through how to talk to someone they are worried about, and they are guided through how to make a safety plan and map out positive events and relationships in their life.
Focus: General well-being, stress management
Joypop
Joypop focuses on well-being and stress management. It has features such as mood scales, breathing exercises, and games, along with sleep and crisis support to promote well-being and resilience by targeting emotion regulation.
Focus: General well-being
Mindwell offers evidence-based training validated by academic research along with a MindWell 24/7 Coach to help diverse populations increase resilience, engagement, and well-being while saving time and money on absenteeism, churn, and burnout.
Focus: General well-being, youth mental health
The Moshi Kids app is a healthy form of entertainment, offering games that support active play and stories that inspire fun, exploration, relaxation, or sleep.
There are more than 400 audio stories, meditations, sounds, and music tracks to discover and hundreds of characters to learn from. Moshi Kids offers more than 75 engrossing character-led and skill-building activities to play, promoting youth well-being.
Focus: General well-being, youth mental health
PTSD Family Coach provides support for individuals with family members living with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It helps individuals learn about PTSD and how to take care of themselves, and it provides education on how to manage relationships with loved ones and/or children. PTSD Family Coach also has information on how to help your loved one get the treatment they deserve.
Features include:
- information about PTSD and how it affects those who care about someone with PTSD
- tips to help families better support a loved one with PTSD, and themselves
- information on how to find counselling
- facts about counselling for individuals or couples managing PTSD
- tools to help family members manage stress
- a self-created support network of people to connect with when in need
Focus: Panic attacks, anxiety
Rootd focuses on panic attacks and anxiety. It helps users to understand and overcome their anxiety and panic attacks with a therapist-approved panic button, guided by deep breathing, an anxiety journal, soothing visualizations, stats pages, emergency contacts, and lessons.
Focus: General well-being
Sorted offers positive mental health training audio programs based on scientific research that can help you feel better, lift your mood, and help you to recover from stress, anxiety, and depression by building resilience and developing positive feelings.