Mental health assessment method and kiosk-based system for implementation

A method for generating a medical alert in response to an assessment of a mental state of a human subject, the method comprising:

• retrieving a medical history of the subject from a medical histories database and accepting at least one attribute from the medical history for determination of the mental state of the subject, wherein the at least one attribute is obtained by inquiries to the subject and by measurements preformed on the subject,
• presenting one or more questions to the subject about the at least one attribute from the medical history of the subject, wherein the subject is prompted with at least one question on a display of a graphic user interface of a system for assessment of the mental state of the subject, the system comprising the display, an input device, a processor, a computer-readable memory, the medical histories database, an alert database comprising a plurality of alert events, and a matrix for calculating an assessment score corresponding to the mental state of the subject;
• using at least one sensor to perform one or more measurements on the subject comprising at least one of:
• brain activity, cardiac activity, vascular activity, peripheral neural signals, hemodynamic activity, or metabolic activity,
• receiving a long form answer to the one or more questions presented to the subject and data acquired by measurements on the subject about the at least one attribute from the medical history of the subject for the determination of the mental state of the subject,
• recording the long form answer to the one or more questions in the input device of the system, storing at least one response in the memory and determining whether certain pre-specified words or phrases of concern are contained in the long form answer;
• programming the processor to:
• calculate the assessment score corresponding to the mental state of the subject based on the long form answer and storing the assessment score in the memory, wherein the processor utilizes the matrix to calculate the assessment score based on the long form answer;
• compare the one or more measurements on the subject with corresponding one or more predetermined thresholds;
• determine by at least one health professional, based on the calculated assessment score and the comparison with the one or more predetermined thresholds, the mental state of the subject;
• and
• incorporating the mental state of the subject into an electronic health record associated with the subject that is present in the medical histories database,
• wherein the assessment score and the comparison with the one or more predetermined thresholds trigger the system to present an automatic alert for review by the at least one health professional if the assessment score matches an alert event in the alert database and the one or more measurements on the subject exceed corresponding one or more predetermined thresholds.