| | | |  By Casey Ross, Katie Palmer, Mario Aguilar, and Mohana Ravindranath | In mere days, the health tech team will be converging on San Francisco for the STAT Health Tech Summit. Join us! It's on Tuesday, May 24, and you can learn more about the event and all the great speakers here. | | | Cerebral shakeup continues The embattled online mental health care platform’s board of directors moved this week to replace CEO and co-founder Kyle Robertson with its president and chief medical officer David Mou — all while it faces a federal inquiry from the Drug Enforcement Agency related to its ADHD medication prescribing practices, The Wall Street Journal reported late Tuesday. Robertson wasn’t included in that meeting and lost access to the company’s Slack afterwards, according to that report. Robertson has called that move illegal. The news came shortly after Robertson told staff Monday that the company would stop prescribing almost all controlled substances; Cerebral had already planned to pause prescribing controlled substances for ADHD. | Remote monitoring and financial incentives fail to move the needle in heart study Combining remote monitoring with rewards like lottery tickets for health progress didn't do much to reduce death or hospitalization among heart failure patients, researchers wrote in a study published in JAMA Internal Medicine this month. The trial, which covered more than 550 people, offered heart failure patients digital scales and electronic pill bottles that recorded their adherence to medication regimens and weight changes. They were given lottery tickets that were activated only conditional on taking their previous day’s medication and measuring their weight. Those patients didn’t fare any better than the ones who got regular care, researchers found. Researchers pointed to a range of possible reasons: The trial might have taken place too long after patients were discharged, especially since many readmissions happen just a few days after discharge, for instance. | Unmatched healthcare system + $1B city investment = an innovation hub in NYC Driven by the largest biotech workforce in the US, 9 major medical centers, 50+ hospitals, and a robust VC & startup ecosystem, NYC has all the makings of an innovation hub. LifeSci NYC is a $1B city initiative to support the industry, and help companies expand and grow. Discover more about life sciences in NYC. | Mental health apps boomed during the pandemic. Now what?  Apptopia
Consumer mental health apps saw a surge in downloads during the pandemic, fueled by increased openness to using tech to address gaps in care for people struggling with anxiety and depression. But Apptopia, a mobile app analytics company, looked at the recent trajectory of five popular services targeting behavioral health — Headspace, Calm, Talkspace, Teladoc’s BetterHelp, and Noom — and suggests their collective momentum has slowed. Most of these companies raised money or went public as inventors saw opportunity in digital health during the pandemic, but there was always the nagging question of whether the increased usage during lockdown would stick around. While Apptopia doesn’t disclose its proprietary methods and the data doesn’t tell the whole story for companies in terms of revenues and health outcomes, the chart above hints that in terms of app downloads and monthly active users the companies are heading into a new phase. | Pear’s efforts show up on the balance sheet On the prescription side of the mental health apps market, Pear Therapeutics reported earnings this week. The company, which has three Food and Drug Administration-cleared apps treating opiate use disorder, substance use disorder, and insomnia is starting to get what looks like traction. The company reported over 9,000 prescriptions written for its apps and $2.7 million in revenue in the quarter. It maintained its previously stated goal of $22 million in revenue this year and projects 50-60,000 prescriptions. While these numbers remain modest compared to Pear’s ambitions, they illustrate that the company’s wide-ranging efforts to raise awareness and acceptance of its products are starting to bear fruit.
And elsewhere in software medicine, the Digital Therapeutics Alliance, the industry group representing Pear and others, released its DTx Value Assessment & Integration Guide. The product of a two-year effort, the guide “harmonizes expectations related to DTx product quality, security, clinical evaluation, and regulatory requirements” to aid policymakers, payers, and clinicians in considering the new treatment options. | Deals -
Biotech company PostEra announced a $110 million, five-year partnership with the National Institutes of Health to make small molecule antiviral therapeutics, guided by artificial intelligence. -
Sidekick Health, which recently announced a $55 million fundraise for its business developing apps to work alongside pharmaceuticals, announced a new app to support Pfizer’s new treatment for eczema. The company has had a relationship with the pharma giant since 2020. -
Spring Health, which provides tech-enabled mental health solutions to employers and health plans, announced it acquired Weldon, to help it expand into family-oriented mental health care. | | | Thanks for reading! More next week,  | | | | Have a news tip or comment? Email Us | |
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