Yvette Roke, PhD
Psychiatrist
GGz Centraal
NETHERLANDS
Since 2001, Yvette has served as a psychiatrist at GGz Centraal, the fourth largest psychiatric hospital in the Netherlands. Alongside her clinical work, she is a dedicated innovator and researcher, deeply committed to improving the lives of individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
In 2013, she earned her PhD with a focus on prolactin-related side effects of antipsychotics in children and adolescents with ASD. Following her doctorate, her efforts have centred on developing more suitable and person-centred treatment options that help both adults and young people with ASD navigate daily stress.
Working in full co-creation with clients and individuals with lived experience, she developed the mHealth application SAM—Stress Autism Mate. This personalised app empowers individuals with ASD to manage stress in everyday life, promoting greater self-direction and wellbeing.
Her pioneering work has been widely recognised. In 2021, she received the Health Valley Bridge Prize and the Tenzinger Healthcare Smart Innovation Award. SAM received the Bronze Award for Sensible Care at the prestigious VGZ health insurer awards the following year.
Building on this success, she and her team have continued to co-create additional self-management tools. These include SAM Junior, designed for young people aged 12–18 with ASD, and STAPPvoorstap (Step-by-Step), a self-direction app for individuals on mental health waiting lists in the Netherlands. This app supports stress management and shares powerful lived experience stories and valuable mental health information.
Both apps have been developed with individuals with lived experience at every stage, ensuring true co-creation. They are scientifically validated, data secure, and accessible in seven languages: Dutch, German, French, Ukrainian, English, Turkish, and Danish. All apps are free of charge and currently available via the App Store and Google Play within Europe.
In 2024, she founded Glloww, a company dedicated to enhancing mental wellbeing in the workforce, continuing her mission to make mental health support more inclusive, empowering, and accessible.
A passionate advocate for collaboration and inclusivity, she is deeply inspired by the strength and wisdom of those with lived experience. Outside of her professional life, she is a proud mother of three teenagers and enjoys exercising and walking her dog.
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This presentation will outline the importance of the transnational scaling in end user involvement in every step, using the design thinking method. This method is a really good way to adapt best practices in digital mental health to other countries. I will present on how we scaled the SAM stressautismmate app from the Netherlands to Denmark and also how we scaled the SAFE app, an app for selfharm, from Denmark to the Netherlands. We did this in the scope of the SUPER project in digital mental health, a collaboration of GGz Centraal (the Netherlands), Thomas More (Belgium) and the Center for Digital Psychiatry (Denmark) with a grant from the European Union, Interreg Northsea. I will present on the challenges we faced, to do's and dont's, recommendations and at the end I will provide guidelines on how to do this yourself. I will also present the context of the big need for this, with 25% of people suffering from mental health issues, long waiting lists, as well as huge problems in the workforce. By scaling and connecting and working together we can bridge the gap and give as many people an equal opportunity and access to mental health. All with the end user involvement at the core.