☁️🍄 Issue No. 028: Therapy Tech

Happy Sunday, and welcome back to Headlines. Another summer week ahead of us, and another mental health scoop ahead of you. As always, happy to have you here. 

Today’s article is thanks to research done by Harvard Business School students David O’Hara and Akshat Agrawal, who sat down with 50+ therapists to find out about their day-to-day lives. 

THERAPY TECH

Being a therapist isn’t easy. From the practical demands of running a business to the emotional toll of serving patients, providers are often burning the candle from both ends. 

What are the biggest challenges facing therapists today, and what tech do they use to lighten their loads? To find out, we went straight to the source. 

COVER ME

By far the biggest pain point? Insurance. 

From low reimbursements rates to mountains of paperwork, filing claims can be a nightmare. Addressing this issue, as we’ve explored with companies like Headway, is a billion-dollar puzzle. Others working on solutions include:

• SonderMind, a patient-therapist matchmaking company that helps therapists accept insurance, notched $150M to reach unicorn status last July.

• Alma and its membership-based credentialing and claim management platform raised a $130M Series D last August.

• Grow Therapy secured a $75M Series B in September to help providers start their practices and partner with payors. 

• Others include Octave ($52M), UpLift ($11M), and Nirvana ($7.5M). 

For out-of-network claims, see Thrizer, Mentaya, and Advekit.

But even with software that streamlines the process, a variety of issues can arise. Claims can be denied due to coding issues or arbitrary insurer decisions, which means that patients may suddenly find they owe thousands more than they expected — a situation that can cause irreparable damage to therapist-client relationships. 

In addition, justifying care to insurers often requires therapists to make clinical diagnoses they don’t feel comfortable making. For example, if a patient is stressed at work, does that necessarily mean they have diagnosable anxiety?

Addressing these concerns will likely require systemic changes beyond startups; getting started, the White House recently put forward some promising propositions. 

BACK OFF(ICE)

Therapists became therapists to help patients, not run a business. 

But whether it’s getting an EIN or finding office space, hiring staff or building their brand, many private practitioners realize they’ve unwittingly become full-time entrepreneurs. 

With no training manual to turn to, many find themselves getting bogged down in all the wrong places. Enter tech:

All-in-one. Among therapists’ favorite tools are EHR software like SimplePractice and TherapyNotes, which help handle admin and operational tasks. Easy and intuitive to use, these platforms offer an array of different features for different practice sizes. 

Pocket assistants. Offerings like AI-powered DeepScribe ($30M) and Blueprint ($9M) help ease the note-taking process. Others include Upheal, Mentalyc, and Corti. And while the tech isn’t there just yet, it’s likely that LLMs will soon be able to help diagnose and even treat clients — a "second opinion" without the cost.

Down to business. Beyond practice management, therapists also need to figure out the business side of things: bigger-picture strategy and planning like goal-setting, budgeting/finances, and finding clients.

• For marketing, Psychology Today remains the most popular among therapists, but there’s also emerging platforms like TherapyDen and Zencare. 

• Heard, an all-in-one financial solution for bookkeeping, accounting, and taxes, closed $15M to help therapists dump spreadsheets once and for all. 

Heard’s brand marketing lead Michael Fulwiler says tech like this is vital, as therapists “don’t learn how to be business owners in graduate school,” adding:

Pick up the phone. And, as telehealth continues to grow in popularity, HIPAA-compliant tools like Doxy, VSee, and NousTalk are emerging, as well as those helping therapists get licensed across states — PSYPACT for psychologists, Counseling Compact for counselors, and Social Work Compact for social workers. 

LOOKING AHEAD

Finally, therapists have their own needs to care for, too. But facing compassion fatigue, financial strain, and isolation, providers are burning out en masse: 

• An analysis of 10K mental health professionals estimated that 40% experience emotional exhaustion, 22% struggle with depersonalization, and 19% feel low levels of personal accomplishment. 

• The percentage of psychologists who reported being unable to meet demand rose from 30% to 46% in 2022. 

And therapists are getting lonelier; while telehealth has been beneficial in many ways, many therapists are now sitting at home on back-to-back Zoom calls for hours on end, instead of being in-office alongside a community of tight-knit peers.

Addressing loneliness and burnout, the tools are unfortunately few and far between. Amidst soaring needs and a chronic, worsening shortage, this is a major concern; already a scarce resource, practitioners are increasingly struggling to stay afloat. 

And the effects ripple out. Therapist burnout has a significant impact on clients, from quality of care to inappropriate behaviors like over-involvement with patients.

Punchline: Therapists devote their lives to healing others, yet the profession can be a thankless job. Tools for the operational side of therapy are a powerful start, and we’ll need even more support and resources—systemic change, peer support, higher pay, and more—to help build better support systems for their vital work. 

Thanks for reading ☁️🍄. Want to join the convo? Tag me @melodaysong with your thoughts, or share with a friend below.

QUICK HITS

• From ABC to GPT. Say hello to PinwheelGPT, a “kid-safe” ChatGPT app. 

• Dig in. A 30-page report on the psychedelic clinic and retreats market. 

• Tamagotchi meets Headspace. Virtual self-care pet game Amaru announces global expansion. 

• Bay State ballot. Massachusetts activists file twin ballot initiatives to legalize psychedelics in the state. 

• Setting standards. BrainFutures and the APPA publish the first-ever set of professional guidelines for practicing psychedelic-assisted therapy. 

• Full steam ahead. Bright Minds reports positive qEEG clinical results for its next-gen substance as a treatment for epilepsy. 

• Shroom zoom. FDA greenlights UCLA and University of Washington to study the effects of Filament’s psilocybin candidate on mental health conditions.

NEWS & TRENDS

1) Baby blues no more?

An underreported crisis, the state of maternal mental health is deteriorating at an alarming rate, from surging hotline calls to an alarming rise in maternal mortality. A major contributor, postpartum depression (PPD) is a vicious and debilitating experience for hundreds of thousands of women. 

Well — this week, in a landmark move, the FDA greenlit the first-ever pill for PPD. Zuranolone, a 14-day pill, is said to improve depressive symptoms in just three days. And it’s a much faster and less invasive option than the only other FDA-approved option, an IV drip. The drug will be commercially available in Q4 of this year — as soon as October 2023. 

The move represents a promising step forward, but it’s far from a panacea. As the global loneliness epidemic worsens, no one’s been hit harder than moms. The isolated infrastructure for modern motherhood is unsustainable; a pill is no substitute for the love and support that emerges from a tight-knit community. → Re-read Issue No. 019: Moms on Mushrooms 

2) Dental, vision, and shrooms

Psychedelic benefits startup Enthea is stepping on the gas. This week, the startup announced that over 50 companies have signed letters of interest to make psychedelic-assisted therapies a work perk.  

That perk has already paid dividends at Dr. Bronner's, where 7% of employees took advantage of covered ketamine therapy. Enthea just released first-year clinical results from the partnership, finding up to 86% improvement in conditions like PTSD, anxiety, and depression.

Rounding out these moves, it’s also teaming up with at-home ketamine provider Nue Life Health to provide DTC options for employees and other patients. As the psychedelic movement stagnates, could employer-sponsored psychedelic plays usher in a true renaissance? → Re-read Issue No. 024: Business Trip

DEALS & DEBUTS

🧠 Neuralink, an implantable brain computer interface (BCI) developer, closed $280M in funding led by Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund.→ source

🎓 Daybreak Health, an adolescent mental health platform, secured a $13M Series B led by Union Square Ventures.→ source

🦸‍♂ Hero Journey Club, a subscription-based community mental health platform for gamers, raised $14.6M.→ source

🏋🏻 ZAMA Health, a mental health platform for the athletic community, secured $500K in an oversubscribed pre-seed round.→ source

🎒 Mantra Health, a higher education digital mental health provider, teamed up with Charlie Health to add its virtual intensive outpatient program (IOP) for teens and young adults to its suite of services.  → source

🤝 Talkiatry, a virtual psychiatry platform, joined forces with virtual OCD provider NOCD to help patients access holistic treatment. → source

🧠 Awakend, a DTC health and wellness company, signed a global exclusivity partnership with BrainTap to sell its brain fitness neurotech headset. → source

🏃 iNSPIRETEK, a Wellness Management System (WMS) for young athletes, announced the launch of the Infinite Score, an evidence-based daily wellbeing check-in tool.→ source, Q&A with CEO Annie Flamsteed

🍇 Aiberry, an AI-powered mental health screening platform, announced a new version of its interface designed specifically for corporate wellness.→ source

WHAT I’M READING

• Lost in translation. Asian Americans are 3x less likely than their White counterparts to seek help for mental health challenges, and also the group least likely to seek mental health support overall. They’re also woefully underrepresented in psychedelic clinical trials. This piece hits on the importance of culturally attuned psychedelic care for all. → DoubleBlind

All set this week, y’all. Wishing you a lovely rest of your day. 🌞🌿

‘Til next Sunday,-Mel