HEADS to bridge India’s mental healthcare gap with AI

NIMHANS, in collaboration with IIT Kharagpur and LGBRIMH, will launch a groundbreaking project called 'HEADS' (Human-in-the-loop Evaluation of Assisted Depression Screening) on Thursday. Funded by the international charity foundation, Wellcome Trust, this two-year study aims to build and evaluate AI-assisted approaches for early depression identification and screening.

The initiative emphasizes the use of Indian regional languages, particularly Kannada, Assamese, Hindi, Bengali, and English, which have been underrepresented in mental health AI research. Project principal investigator, Lekhansh Shukla, highlighted the significant gap in depression treatment in India, stating that only about one in five affected individuals receive timely, appropriate care.

The project's unique human-in-the-loop framework ensures AI tools act as supportive clinical decision-aids, not replacements for professional judgment. The study will embed a 15-member panel of Lived Experience Experts, actively shaping the project's design and informed consent protocols across all phases. Over its 24-month duration, HEADS will record and analyze approximately 4,500 clinical interviews across healthcare sites in NIMHANS and LGBRIMH, while IIT Kharagpur will lead core engineering, system development, and AI-safety work.