Using R;pple to support staff mental wellbeing
At TMD we are committed to looking after and supporting all our staff’s mental health and wellbeing, ensuring help is on hand whenever needed. As an extension to our mental wellbeing support programme, we have installed R;pple software on all employees’ PC’s and urge other businesses to follow suit.
R;pple is an interceptive tool that presents a visual prompt when a person searches for harmful keywords or phrases relating to the topic of self-harm or suicide, which have been identified as linking to potentially damaging online content.
The person is first guided through a filter of breathing exercises, followed by simply and calmly presented strategies, forums, help lines and mental health services they can access immediately and in the longer term. These are accompanied by messages of hope and encouragement to keep safe.
By way of background, R;pple is a charity, set up by Alice Hendy, who lost her only sibling, Josh, on 25th November 2020 to suicide. He was just 21 years of age. After examining Josh’s phone, Alice found he had been researching techniques to take his own life via harmful internet searches. As a specialist in IT and cybersecurity, she established R;pple to ensure more help and support is given to individuals who search for harmful online content.
She says: “R;pple is designed to intervene and catch people at their most vulnerable point when searching for harmful material on the internet and instead provide them with a message of hope and a selection of mental health resources that the person can utilise.”
TMD takes the subject of employee wellbeing very seriously and has two mental health first-aiders on hand - Rachel Karn and Caroline Mooney – who are always available if employees want to talk or require support in any way. Given that online searches for suicide methods have increased by 50% in the last two years, with searches for suicide support lines also up by 150% since January 2019 (Semrush, 2021), we believe R;pple provides an essential safety net that everyone should utilise.
The software is available as a free download for individuals. There is a small cost for businesses and they can easily install R;pple on mass across all their IT infrastructure to protect staff and ensure that their mental health and wellbeing is a priority.
For more information please visit their website (click here)