In Vietnam, an estimated three million people live with depression—yet 83 percent receive no form of care. Community-based mental health services remain scarce, leaving many without support, particularly in rural and low-resource areas.
To address this gap, Canadian researchers at Simon Fraser University (SFU), in partnership with Vietnam’s Institute of Population, Health and Development, developed VMood, a mobile health app designed to make mental health care more accessible and scalable. The app builds on more than a decade of Canadian-led research into community-based depression care.
With Proof-of-Concept funding from Grand Challenges Canada, in partnership with the Government of Canada, the SFU team piloted the VMood app in Vietnam. The pilot showed that VMood’s user-friendly design and availability on Apple and Android devices had strong potential for significant improvements in mental health prevention and promotion.
From pilot to scale with government partnerships
VMood combines digital self-management tools based on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy with remote human support. The app guides users through exercises focused on reactivating daily life, problem-solving, and realistic thinking, while also connecting them with trained lay health and social service workers who provide coaching through the app. This task-sharing approach helps extend care beyond clinical settings into communities.
With their first round of Transition-to-Scale funding, the team at Simon Fraser University successfully demonstrated the effectiveness of a community-based, low-cost psychosocial self-supported management (SSM) intervention to reduce symptoms of depression among adults in community-based and primary care settings.
Sustained funding from Grand Challenges Canada has been essential—not just for developing the technology, but for building long-term partnerships and supporting real change at both the community and policy levels.
— Leena Chau, SFU research manager.
With their latest round of TTS funding, SFU along with their government partners, including Vietnam’s Ministry of Health, seeks to strengthen impact and feasibility of the scaling plan for the Vmood app and provide access to VMood to treat depression in more provinces in Vietnam.
Today, VMood is being tested across multiple Vietnamese provinces through a randomized controlled trial led by researchers from SFU, the University of British Columbia, and partners in Vietnam and Australia. The project offers promising evidence that digital mental health tools, backed by sustained funding and international collaboration, can help close care gaps in low-resource settings.