Cerebral: The Future Potential in Mental Health Lies in Leveraging AI For Care Provision

Access to mental health services wasn’t great before the pandemic. Then two things happened: the need for mental health services increased. But so has access to telemedicine providers of mental health support.

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) enabled flexibilities regarding the prescription of controlled medications. In 2020, the Food and Drug Administration announced a pandemic enforcement policy allowing mental health app developers to release certain treatment products without seeking authorization from the agency.

Cerebral is a US online therapy provider, founded in 2019. In 2021, the company raised close to half a billion dollars and was valued at 4.8 billions USD. Even Olympic gymnast Simone Biles, who withdraw from the Olympic games in Tokyo in 2020 due to personal mental health struggles, and became a public advocate for a new attitude and public perception of how we approach mental health, struck a partnership with Cerebral, joining as an investor and its chief impact officer.

But then in 2022, things started to shift in the opposite direction, due to allegations of unsafe prescribing practices. The Wall Street Journal, Insider, and other media publications investigated and reported about these through the accounts of patients and former employees, and the Department of Justice launched an investigation about “possible violations” of the Controlled Substances Act. Eventually, in 2022, the company dropped prescribing of Controlled Substance Prescriptions entirely.

Today Cerebral is moving forward and is betting on quality mental health provision, with high hopes around enhancements that could be achieved with the help of AI. In today’s discussion, you will hear from Cerebral’s CEO David Mou, talk about:

• The current state of telemedicine, and the changing legislation about required in-person visits for prescriptions,
• Speed and quality of mental health diagnosis and treatment through telemedicine,
• The role of AI in mental health

Website: www.facesofdigitalhealth.com

Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/

Read more on mental health:

https://fodh.substack.com/p/mentalhealth

Healthcare digitalization in South America Ep. 1: How digital is Peru? (Jhonatan Bringas)

After a series about digital health in the APAC region,  this is the first episode about healthcare and digital health in South America. 

Speaker: Peruvian clinician and innovation Jhonatan Bringas Dimitriades, MD. Jhonatan is based in the Netherlands, work across continents as an MD and executive at various tech companies. We discussed healthcare digitalization in Peru,

Topics: 

• The state of healthcare digitalization in Peru and other countries in Latin America.
• Opportunities and challenges for startups working with public hospitals in Peru.
• The need for more education and training in artificial intelligence for healthcare professionals in Latin America.
• The potential for technology to address issues of access, high mortality rates, and other epidemiological issues in Peru and other countries in the region.
• The importance of validated data in understanding ethnicities and epidemiological components in Latin America.

Past episodes on South America: https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/digitalheath-south-america  

https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/sleep-and-digital-health-in-brazil 

Website: www.facesofdigitalhealth.com

Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/

Women’s Health Globally: What Does It Mean in Different Cultures?

Women’s Health has increasingly garnered attention, with growing research, investments, and discussions surrounding the topic. Although overall digital health investments experienced a decline last year compared to previous years, the proportion of funds allocated to femtech within the digital health budget has seen an upward trend. However, there is still significant progress to be made. Women’s health encompasses more than just pregnancy care, breast and ovarian cancer, or fertility. It also includes addressing gender-based violence and promoting pleasure. In today’s episode, we will be hearing from Shamala Hinrichsen – Founder and CEO – Hanai, an application providing reliable health information to the underserved communities in Malaysia and Africa and Mariatheresa Samson Kadushi – Founder and CEO of Mobile Afya – the first USSD application in Africa using internet-free mobile technology to provide basic health information in local and native languages starting with Swahili in Tanzania, East Africa. 

Mariatheresa and Shamala were already on Faces of digital health in 2021:

Tune in:

F126 How is Tradition Hindering Health Literacy in Kenya, Tanzania and Malaysia? (Shamala Hinrichsen, Mariatheresa Samson Kadushi): 

https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/women-health-africa-malaysia-mobile-afya-hanai 

The reason this is important is, that, based on the meeting on this show, Shamala and Mariatheresa are now building a new app together. Sheher app aims to address the gap in knowledge about female health, which goes beyond pregnancy-related issues. They bring medical education and access while also bringing women into the conversation through personal stories validated by medical info. Their team brings cultural diversity as well as generational differences to tackle this broad aspect of women’s health globally. 

More about She Her App: www.sheher.app

Website: www.facesofdigitalhealth.com

Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/

Show notes:

Introducing the speakers (00:08-02:49)

Topics covered under Mobile Afia and Hanai (03:33-06:35)

The importance of sharing personal stories backed up by medical information (09:01-14:57)

Differences between the new app and previous projects (15:11-17:48)

Adapting technology to cultural contexts (27:03-31:19)

The impact of the app, investments in research and solutions for femtech (33:05-42:48)

APAC Series Ep. 4: What is Fueling Hesitancy Towards Telemedicine in South Korea? (Mira Kang)

In South Korea, life expectancy at birth was 82.7 years in 2017, higher than the OECD average of 80.8. At the moment, Korea has one of the youngest populations among OECD countries, with only 13.8% aged 65 or over. This is expected to increase considerably in the next decades. At HIMSS 2023 in Chicago Mira Kang Vice Chief Medical Information Officer at the Samsung Medical Center in South Korea explained why a country that is an IT powerhouse and has fast-speed internet is widely available, isn’t embracing telemedicine. Koreans access a lot of services through their mobile phones, and hospitals are introducing AI, robots and data-driven precision medicine. 

The health security system in Korea has two components: mandatory social health insurance, which provides healthcare coverage to all citizens, and is funded through contributions from those who are insured and government subsidies. The second part is the medical aid program, which is a form of public assistance that uses government subsidies to provide low-income groups with healthcare services. While the rest of the world is increasingly looking at virtual care and telemedicine for healthcare sustainability and ease of access to healthcare services, telemedicine will likely be forbidden again soon since the pandemic has ended. 

APAC Series Ep. 3: Easy Access To Clinicians and At-Home Testing in Vietnam

This is the third episode in a series of discussions about digital health and healthcare in the APAC region.

In this episode, Beth Ann Lopez, a Co-founder and CEO at Docosan, a healthcare marketplace that aims to make it effortless to access healthcare and help find a doctor who is available in Vietnam, talks about the state of healthcare in Vietnam, how did she identify the need for easier search and access to healthcare providers, how is Docusan vetting clinicians on the platform, how to start a business in Vietnam, and more.

Episode 1: What is Roche Keeping an Eye on in Thailand? (Farid Bidgoli)

Episode 2: China From A to Z: Healthcare Policy and AI Development (Ruby Wang)

Website: www.facesofdigitalhealth.com

Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/

APAC Series Ep.2: China From A to Z: Healthcare Policy and AI Development (Ruby Wang)

This is the second episode in the Digital health in APAC Series.

The first episode featured Farid Bidgoli, GM for Roche in Thailand, who discussed what is Roche looking into in Thailand when it comes to digital health.

In this episode, the focus is on China. Ruby Wang, former Head of Health for the UK Government in China at the British Embassy Beijing; Adviser on Health Policy for the United Nations Resident Coordinator’s Office in China, who today works as a doctor in the NHS and a consultant to companies interested in entering the Chinese market, talks about:

• How is Chinese healthcare system changing,
• How to succeed in the Chinese market,
• How do the Chinese data privacy laws impact AI development in China.