digital health

Survey finds concerns AND hope to address growing mental health needs due to the covid pandemic

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Dig­i­tal providers come to the fore to sup­port glob­al men­tal health dur­ing pan­dem­ic (press release):

Research pub­lished today shows how dig­i­tal providers are com­ing togeth­er to sup­port the men­tal health needs of mil­lions of users unable to access tra­di­tion­al ser­vices dur­ing the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic. [Read more…] about Sur­vey finds con­cerns AND hope to address grow­ing men­tal health needs due to the covid pandemic

The landscape of digital mental health apps: huge unmet needs, quality concerns, app stores asked to ensure transparency

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Address­ing the men­tal health cri­sis (Phar­ma Field):

Each day we find out more about the men­tal health effects of the pan­dem­ic. Ear­ly on, the Office for Nation­al Sta­tis­tics found that one in five Britons report­ed symp­toms of depres­sion, com­pared with one in 10 before. And, accord­ing to a recent study led by the Uni­ver­si­ty of Not­ting­ham and King’s Col­lege Lon­don, stress, anx­i­ety and depres­sion were all sig­nif­i­cant­ly high­er in par­tic­i­pants com­pared with ‘pop­u­la­tion norms’, with 64% of the par­tic­i­pants report­ing symp­toms of depres­sion and 57% report­ing symp­toms of anx­i­ety. [Read more…] about The land­scape of dig­i­tal men­tal health apps: huge unmet needs, qual­i­ty con­cerns, app stores asked to ensure transparency

FDA releases first Artificial Intelligence (AI) regulatory plan to promote responsible digital health innovation

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FDA Releas­es Arti­fi­cial Intelligence/Machine Learn­ing Action Plan (FDA press release):

Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Admin­is­tra­tion released the agency’s first Arti­fi­cial Intelligence/Machine Learn­ing (AI/ML)-Based Soft­ware as a Med­ical Device (SaMD) Action Plan. This action plan describes a mul­ti-pronged approach to advance the Agency’s over­sight of AI/ML-based med­ical soft­ware … The AI/ML-Based Soft­ware as a Med­ical Device Action Plan out­lines five actions that the FDA intends to take, including:

  • Fur­ther devel­op­ing the pro­posed reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work, includ­ing through issuance of draft guid­ance on a pre­de­ter­mined change con­trol plan (for software’s learn­ing over time);

[Read more…] about FDA releas­es first Arti­fi­cial Intel­li­gence (AI) reg­u­la­to­ry plan to pro­mote respon­si­ble dig­i­tal health innovation

Startup Big Health raises $39M to universalize access to cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for anxiety and poor sleep

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Big Health Hones Dig­i­tal Men­tal Health Ther­a­py With $39M Series B (Crunch­base):

“Start­up Big Health believes indi­vid­u­als can improve their men­tal health through its tech­nol­o­gy that focus­es on cog­ni­tive behav­ioral ther­a­py ver­sus med­ica­tion or the help of human therapists.

On Thurs­day it raised $39 mil­lion in a Series B financ­ing to advance that objective.

[Read more…] about Start­up Big Health rais­es $39M to uni­ver­sal­ize access to cog­ni­tive behav­ioral ther­a­py (CBT) for anx­i­ety and poor sleep

Update: Moderate lifetime drinking may lead to lower Alzheimer-related beta amyloid deposits in the brain

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Time for a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e‑newsletter.

#1. First of all, it’s not all bad news this month. Study finds that mod­er­ate life­time drink­ing may lead to low­er Alzheimer-relat­ed beta amy­loid deposits in the brain

#2. And, talk about per­son­al­ized med­i­cine! This fas­ci­nat­ing study show­ing how brain imag­ing (fMRI) + machine learn­ing + inten­sive, non-inva­sive neu­rostim­u­la­tion = tar­get­ed treat­ments that can max­i­mize effi­ca­cy and min­i­mize side effects: Rein­vent­ing depres­sion treat­ment via tran­scra­nial mag­net­ic brain stim­u­la­tion (TMS)

#3. Also, not a minute too soon … Med­i­ta­tion apps have gone main­stream in the covid-19 era and Dig­i­tal health start-ups raised a record $3.1 bil­lion in Q1; focus will like­ly evolve from providers to con­sumers and employers

#4. Fyi, a very time­ly vir­tu­al event com­ing Tues­day April 28th, online: Explore strate­gies and tools to boost men­tal well­be­ing dur­ing (and after) Covid-19

#5. Now, “While Pear has an advan­tage over the com­pe­ti­tion in that its prod­ucts are backed by ran­dom­ized clin­i­cal tri­als, physi­cians and health plans are still work­ing out how to pre­scribe and pay for dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tics.” The FDA clears Som­ryst, Pear’s dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tic to treat chron­ic insomnia

#6. Net net, now is the time for indi­vid­ual and col­lec­tive action to shift to a health­i­er “new nor­mal” for all: 3 ways to pro­tect your men­tal health dur­ing –and after– COVID-19 (in Span­ish: Tres hábitos de higiene men­tal para vencer al COVID-19 y crear un futuro más salud­able). Want more? Enjoy these Three tips for wise minds to calm coro­n­avirus anxiety

#7. A small but impor­tant study for that hope­ful near future when uni­ver­si­ties and col­leges reopen their doors: Study finds mixed results of Adder­all as cog­ni­tive enhancer (seems to boost emo­tion more than cognition)

#8. But, first things first. “The Bee Gees song “Stayin’ Alive” reached #1 on the pop charts in 1977. Maybe it was the beat, maybe it was John Travolta’s danc­ing. Or maybe it’s that the Gibb broth­ers’ cen­tral lyric is quite lit­er­al­ly always play­ing in our head. Keep­ing us safe —that is, “stayin’ alive ”— is the pri­ma­ry mis­sion of the brain”

Enough with coro­n­avirus out­break. Any­thing else going on? Yes!

#9. The Right to Per­son­al Iden­ti­ty. The Right to Free Will. The Right to Men­tal Pri­va­cy. The Right to Equal Access to Men­tal Aug­men­ta­tion. The Right to Pro­tec­tion from Algo­rith­mic Bias. Will these five Neu­roR­ights help har­ness emerg­ing neu­rotech­nolo­gies for the com­mon good?

#10. “Today, the sci­en­tif­ic inves­ti­ga­tion of tran­scen­dent expe­ri­ences is, in my view, one of the most excit­ing fron­tiers in the sci­ence of well-being.” Tran­scend­ing Maslow’s famous “hier­ar­chy of needs” through Maslow’s own research on Peak Experiences

#11. You CAN have your cake and eat it too: Here’s a brain teas­er to stim­u­late your men­tal imagery, spa­tial rota­tion … and appetite

#12. Ques­tion: My first thought after con­grat­u­lat­ing myself on being so clever about some­thing? Tease your brain with these eight fun rid­dles…

 

Wish­ing you and yours a great month of May,

 

The Sharp­Brains Team

Digital health start-ups raised a record $3.1 billion in Q1; focus will likely evolve from providers to consumers and employers

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Dig­i­tal health firms raised record sums before Covid-19 hit (Med­C­i­ty News):

“Dig­i­tal Health star­tups raised a record-break­ing $3.1 bil­lion in the first quar­ter of 2020, accord­ing to a report released Mon­day by Rock Health. But now faced with a glob­al pan­dem­ic, the trend is unlike­ly to con­tin­ue [Read more…] about Dig­i­tal health start-ups raised a record $3.1 bil­lion in Q1; focus will like­ly evolve from providers to con­sumers and employers