COVID silver linings: Mental Health awareness and a growing set of offerings
COVID was, and continues to be, an incredible psychological stressor. But it has also spread awareness and considerable growth in mental health therapies.
COVID has been our generation’s greatest psychological struggle. Being forced to all but eliminate in-person interaction, warily engage with public spaces armed with a mask and stockpile of purell bottles, and turn an apartment into an office, gym, and school amongst other things has forced us all to rethink our norms and reconsider our true needs. A friend and I recently talked about reminding ourselves that we have agency in our lives despite the pandemic and its consequences, and he mentioned a John Wooden quote (yes, as a Bruins fan I am anxiously calling a win over Gonzaga): “Things turn out best for those who make the best out of the way things turn out”.
This would hardly count as a therapy, but it is indicative of a growing, and much needed, conversation around mental health. Sparked by Sarah Du’s and Olivia Webb’s recent posts, I’ve been thinking about how this conversation can be viewed through cultural shifts and the provision of digital offerings while COVID becomes less of a direct public health threat and more of a risk to mitigate; as the population vaccinated goes up, therapies will inevitably face a junction of continuing to gain interest or adoption by more conveniently engaging patients, or they will dwindle away.
Sarah published a robust market map showing the offering- and funding-based growth in the mental health market, alongside a set of hurdles inhibiting mental health therapies from gaining traction amongst patients and in the broader healthcare ecosystem:
Four of the biggest challenges in mental healthcare are:
Lack of access
Inconsistent quality
Regulation at times constraining innovation
Discrimination
How can an offering begin to address these hurdles together in the provision of care? I think it will be through:
A platform-based and verticalized approach that enable asynchronous, 1:1, and group interactions between a patient and a professional (or even medicated digital content - more to come on that in my next post)
A growth in research to establish evidence-based benchmarks to base assessments of efficacy; this study on VR interventions for psychiatric disorders highlights that we are at the beginning of a series of studies that will clarify the role of digital therapies in treating mental health conditions
Broader social pressure, and regulatory and payer interest in identifying and treating mental health conditions. Recent changes from CMS and HIPAA have eased requirements and increased reimbursements, making it a LOT easier for providers to even just test offerings without significant financial or regulatory pressures, and for patients to have a better healthcare experience (more to come on the broader healthcare ecosystem in a separate post).
Increases in self-care modalities will decrease the stigma associated with talking about and addressing mental health. I can’t count the number of times I’ve discussed meditation, the Big Quiet, Headspace, or Calm, but as individuals more actively prioritize managing their mental health the topic and relevant offerings will continue to grow. Discrimination will remain a large, societal issue but will ebb away over time; in my opinion investments in public education will help us see more of ourselves in others, and understand the different historical and current contexts that shape our experiences. It will make it harder to discriminate and help us all become more active in severely punishing those who choose to discriminate.
This is a lot to consider, but think a few companies do a good job highlighting this start:
Pear Therapeutics (in the digital therapeutics box of the market map) and Everlywell. Pear’s launch of RESET and RESET-O for the treatment of substance and opoid use disorder swith Prescryptive health signals the importance of a platform in delivering care; I think the first of its kind digital, blockchain-enabled platform will show meaningful improvements in patient adherence and potentially cost of care as well.
Everlywell’s acquisition of PWNHealth also highlights the value of a patient-first digital experience in enabling a stronger patient:provider relationship with a stronger role of diagnostics in the provision of care.
I look forward to diving deeper into mental health by looking into the role of digital therapies such as EndeavorRx as well as the research coming out of the Huberman lab so stay tuned!