Matt Byerly, M.D.<\/a>, who is program director and holds several faculty positions at KU Wichita. \u201cAnd because there\u2019s so much challenge in having available a mental health workforce in rural regions, this becomes a partial solution for that challenge.\u201d<\/p>\nEarlier this year, Byerly secured a five-year, $28 million grant from the federal Rural Health Transformation Program to fund the effort.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur ultimate goal is to provide widespread access to people over the five-year grant,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The first phase of the initiative will introduce rural residents who may be experiencing depression to a self-administered, interactive cognitive behavioral therapy platform called Thrive. Cognitive behavior therapy is usually described as a method of reducing mental health problems by teaching people different ways to think, behave and feel.<\/p>\n
Thrive isn\u2019t meant to replace trained mental health professionals, but it is an acknowledgement that their current supply can\u2019t meet the demand. And, Byerly thinks Thrive may actually offer some advantages.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For one, he said, \u201cIt\u2019s better for overcoming the stigma (associated) with going to see a mental health professional in person in a rural setting. Rural residents have more concern about that than non-rural residents.\u201d<\/p>\n
For another, he said, \u201cPeople can do it at any time and any setting of their choosing. That\u2019s really helpful for people who are working. It\u2019s immediate and flexible.\u201d<\/p>\n
And finally, he noted, \u201cIt\u2019s going to be free of cost to them.\u201d<\/p>\n
The focus on depression is based on its prevalence. Estimates are that one in five Americans experience depression at some point in their lives, often with devastating consequences for themselves, their careers and the people around them.<\/p>\n
\u201cDepression is the most disabling of all health conditions, not just mental health\u201d conditions, Byerly said. According to several reports, at least 85 of Kansas\u2019 105 counties have a shortage of mental health professionals \u2014 basically, everything outside Sedgwick County, north-central Kansas and northeast Kansas.<\/p>\n
Thrive was created by a Seattle-based Waypoint Health Innovations and has been around about a decade, Byerly said. It employs a combination of videos and interactive tools to guide users through cognitive behavior therapy sessions.<\/p>\n
When users first log in to Thrive, they are shown an introductory video, then answer questions about themselves that determine which of three intervention modules they start with. Each module starts with a brief testimonial about cognitive behavior therapy, Byerly said. \u201cThat\u2019s absolutely critical because it tries to address questions they might have, like \u2018Is this brain washing?\u2019 and \u2018Can I trust this?\u2019 That\u2019s meant to address worries and also gain investment and buy-in.\u201d<\/p>\n
A series of videos then guide users through steps of cognitive behavior therapy designed to lessen depression, and they\u2019re given homework to focus on before their next session. When they log back in and share what they\u2019ve experienced, they are directed to more cognitive behavior therapy exercises. Each module consists of 10 sessions with multiple videos lasting several minutes each. If a user desires, his or her progress can be monitored by a mental health professional or their primary care provider.<\/p>\n
Byerly said the entire Thrive video library consists of more than 300 videos, which allows the sessions to be individually tailored to users based on their interaction with the program. The videos are sorted into three modules or categories focusing on cognitive restructuring, which is the addressing of inaccurate or negative thoughts; rewarding activities; and assertive communications.<\/p>\n
New version, new feel\u00a0<\/p>\n
Byerly\u2019s work in digital mental health includes two studies involving Thrive. In the first, rural residents praised the program\u2019s easy accessibility, ability to avoid stigma and other benefits, but said it \u201cneeded to have a rural feel.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThey loved all the positives I mentioned of easy accessibility, ability to avoid stigma and so forth,\u201d Byerly said. \u201cBut they said, \u2018We think it could look and sound and relate to us more like our experiences than it does.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
In response, the research team, consisting of KU faculty and the owner of Thrive, culturally adapted Thrive, including shooting new videos. A subsequent study found that the adapted program was effective in reducing depression and anxiety symptoms and improving functioning and resilience among a mostly rural population, with effects generally larger than those reported for other fully automated online cognitive behavioral therapy interventions.<\/p>\n
Thrive isn\u2019t available to the general public but is used by some healthcare systems such as Kaiser, based in California, and the Henry Ford Health system, headquartered in Detroit. In rural Kansas, Byerly said, \u201cWe will be the ones supporting access to the service.\u201d<\/p>\n
Byerly said Thrive will be promoted through rural clinicians, social media and other engagement avenues, and community partners such as churches, employers and insurers. No prescription is needed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll be building bridges along all those pathways to help people become aware that Thrive exists, that it\u2019s effective and this is how you access it,\u201d Byerly said.<\/p>\n
Byerly is professor, chair of the\u00a0Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences<\/a>, and associate dean for research at KU School of Medicine-Wichita. He directs the Program in Digital Mental Health, with Frank Materia, Ph.D., serving as associate director. The initiative also includes two KU School of Medicine-Kansas City teams with expertise in community health worker-supported interventions (Sarah Kessler, Ph.D., MPH, and Allen Greiner, M.D., MPH) and health communication (Ayo Olagoke, Ph.D., MPH), as well as an implementation evaluation team from the University of Wisconsin led by Shellie Ellis, Ph.D.<\/p>\n\u201cWe\u2019ll be continually learning and testing and refining our approach to create more reach and more support for people using it,\u201d Byerly said.<\/p>\n
He believes Thrive can supplement antidepressant medications that an estimated 13% of Americans now take, a market supported by \u201cbillions\u201d on marketing spent by pharmaceutical firms.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what it takes to get the word out,\u201d he said. \u201cThese (digital) interventions are at least as effective as antidepressants but they\u2019ve had no advocates and they\u2019ve also had no payer. That\u2019s why we\u2019re here and that\u2019s the significant resource that\u2019s needed.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This screenshot and the one below are from videos for the new Program in Digital Mental Health, a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":832182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[97,259,260],"class_list":["post-832181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-health","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/832181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=832181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/832181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/832182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=832181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=832181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=832181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"This](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1787070275744.jpeg\")
This screenshot and the one below are from videos for the new Program in Digital Mental Health, a joint effort between the KU School of Medicine-Wichita Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences and the KU Center for Telemedicine & Telehealth.\u00a0<\/p>\n