| |  By Casey Ross, Katie Palmer, Mario Aguilar, and Mohana Ravindranath | Good morning, health tech readers! Mohana here with a rundown on weight loss companies, mental health apps, and billion-dollar opportunities for purveyors of health-related software. Also happening today: this conference on machine learning in health care, which you can watch via Zoom. | | | Virtual weight loss companies raise alarms As telehealth companies prescribing novel weight loss drugs proliferate, experts are increasingly worried that a rise in direct-to-consumer platforms could harm patients. That’s partly because even companies that pair prescriptions with coaching aren’t equipped to offer long-term care, which could put chronic disease patients at risk. Experts say good weight loss support is hard to come by, and more access could be very beneficial to patients. But they also warn some of these companies may be less focused on patients and more focused on churning out prescriptions to turn a profit. “The world of obesity and weight loss treatments and products have forever been a wild west,” said Scott Kahan, director of a weight management clinic in Washington, D.C. “While there’s a legitimate core of the field, far more that surrounds it is bogus and nonsense and predatory. And a lot of these telehealth companies, from what I’ve seen, are sort of toeing the line between them.” Katie has the full story. | What we don’t know about mental health apps A paper examining six clinical trials for four FDA-cleared mental health apps says there’s a need to surface more data about how much people actually use digital health treatments like those apps. The companies are marketed by Akili Interactive, which received FDA clearance in 2020 for a video-game based treatment for childhood ADHD, and Pear Therapeutics, which has three FDA-cleared apps for substance use disorder, opioid use disorder and insomnia treatment. “Is it people opening the app and, you know, muddling through it?” asked lead author P. Murali Doraiswamy. “Is it people who are really, really engaging with the app? If the app has 20 modules, are people going through all 20 modules?” Mario has more. | Digital therapeutics drive toward readouts Digital therapeutics companies are barreling ahead with clinical trials to back their FDA submissions. Better Therapeutics, which went public through a SPAC last year, announced the results of its pivotal trial of a cognitive behavioral therapy app for type 2 diabetes: After 180 days, app users saw small but statistically significant reductions in hemoglobin A1C of 0.4% compared to a group receiving standard of care alone. The company expects to submit the results as part of a de novo application in the third quarter. In the leadup to its pivotal trial, planned to begin this year, Cognito Therapeutics continues to trickle out results from its six-month safety-focused randomized controlled trial of GammaSense. The software and device approach to tackle mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s disease showed good adherence and reasonable safety in data reported at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference. Results also pointed to a potential impact on white matter, with reduced atrophy in the user group. | Biomarkers: The Foundation of Personalized Oncology Register for a virtual event on August 17 to hear researchers, academics, and business leaders discuss what recent innovations in biomarkers mean for the future of cancer treatments. | Study: Care coordination tech boosts cancer care An automated system that reviewed liver radiology reports and flagged abnormal cases for review improved the timeliness of patients’ health care, finds a small study covering a few hundred patients between 2010 to 2015. The study, published in PLOS Digital Health, examined the impact of the tracking system at a Veterans Affairs hospital that also allowed care coordinators to assign follow-up tasks for clinicians like specialist appointments or further imaging. The system, which was linked to electronic health records, could also alert patients about upcoming events or ones they missed.
The study suggests that automated care coordination systems could improve the timeliness of diagnosis and care, authors wrote. | Billion-dollar opportunities in health tech 
A new analysis from Bessemer Venture Partners breaks down what’s happening within two broad business models in health tech: health care software as a service, and tech-driven care and care navigation. The latter is much more prevalent, authors say: of the roughly $4 trillion in health care spending last year, about three quarters is related to care delivery, and a quarter is from administrative costs, according to the report. That administrative spending presents a real opportunity, though — the authors argue a sizable share of those costs are “unnecessary and could be automated.”
| Deals and funding -
Home-based health care tech company MedArrive, co-founded by former Lyft and Uber executive Dan Trigub, is partnering with Medicaid-focused virtual behavioral health company Brave Health to refer MedArrive customers in need of behavioral health care to Brave. -
Medical device company ResMed bought German company Mementor, which sells digital therapeutics for insomnia. -
Rural health startup Homeward has raised $50 million in a round led by ARCH Venture Partners and Human Capital. Homeward is founded by Teladoc-owned chronic care company Livongo’s former chief medical officer, Jennifer Schneider, and is backed by former Livongo chief financial officer Lee Shapiro and and former chief executive officer Glen Tullman of 7wireVentures. - Summer Health, a text messaging platform for pediatric medical advice, has emerged out of stealth, FierceHealthcare reports.
- Actuarial company Milliman and price comparison site Turquoise Health are working together to crunch newly price transparency data recently published under federal rules.
| Names in the news - Iodine Software, which sells AI-powered software for clinical documentation improvement, has named Priti Shah its chief product and technology officer. Shah was previously vice president of product and solutions at Wolters Kluwer Health.
- Rob Schutz, co-founder of Ro, is leaving the direct-to-consumer prescription company, though he’ll continue to serve on the board, FastCompany reported.
- Online mental health company Modern Health named Jesse Calderon its chief technology officer. Calderon was previously a senior vice president at Tableau.
| What we’re reading -
Data brokers aren’t budging on calls to stop collecting data on pregnant people, Politico -
The Space Force is using wearables instead of an annual fitness test, NPR -
‘How can you not be excited?’: AI experts share enthusiasm about its future in health care, STAT | Thanks for reading! More next week,  | | | | Have a news tip or comment? Email Us | |
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