Launch HN: Osmind (YC S20) – software for better mental health therapies

> Our EHR also automates administrative tasks such as collecting intake forms and getting reimbursement from insurance companies.

Sounds good on paper but I am not sure if I would want processes that heavily collect psychometric data and automate insurance to coexist in the same company. It is a matter of a flip of a switch (e.g. repealing of ACA) before insurance companies might legally have access to that psychometric data, with sweet profits left to this company. Even though right now they are in HIPAA land, since that data probably doesn’t qualify as therapists notes, it won’t have the same protections.

My second issue is overfocus on treatments like ketamine, psychedelics etc. I get that they target treatment resistant population, but maybe having this additional psychometric data would have rendered more conventional treatments efficacious to begin with? Or this would be a therapy modality in itself? (Pervasive technology) Or maybe it is going to be completely neutral because the extra effort required from therapist to analyze and interpret this data is not going to be worth it, or the AI won’t match the sophistication of the problems? Biomarkers for mental ails is indeed the holy grail, but the signal to noise ratio with what we have without getting invasive is pretty low.

Sounds like right now the focus of the compnay is pretty diffuse waiting to pivot on whatever proves most profitable, which is perfectly fine. Hopefully it will end up being something useful to the humanity too.

I would like to think of some of these issues deeply. I don't work in this domain but interested due to personal and family reasons.

Let's stay in touch somewhere if you want.

> Our EHR enables doctors to measure how patients are doing in between appointments via an integrated patient mobile app to drive personalized, improved clinical decision-making. For example, we can use data science to automatically detect symptom exacerbation or improvement (from patient-reported outcomes or functional metrics such as activity levels) and get them in for treatments at the right time.

The problem with patient-reported outcomes or other metrics, is that you are relying on the patient. This trap already exists for the vast majority of people suffering from mental health issues in the United States: in order to conquer your issues you basically need to not have them in the first place. Navigating (maybe battling) insurance, out-of-pocket bills, finding doctors who will take you seriously, and so forth, is really taxing, and when you are already struggling it can be Too Much.

I saw, second-hand, some of the surveys that Stanford sent to their disabled patient, which I would suspect would be used in the same way. The surveys are tiring, exhausting, and frustrating. It's frustrating to be asked the same questions over and over again while you tread water, and have to admit the same shitty answers, whether it's pain or depression or any other miserable symptom.

I am curious what you are doing here that is wholly different from what most institutions are already doing.

Which supplements have proven safe and effective for treating mental health conditions in large scale randomized controlled trials?

Very necessary product. Have you thought about approaches for helping researchers run studies with de-identified but linked data?