附近上门

Mental health care access and affordability continue to be two factors that prevent patients from seeking care. But is out to change that.

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The New York-based startup, founded by , Jake Sussman, Dan Ross and in 2019, is developing a health insurance advisory platform designed to connect patients with therapists, as well as providing administrative support to therapists who don鈥檛 typically accept insurance.

Adams knows about the difficulty of finding a therapist after moving from California to New York, which was a driver for starting Headway. He found that one in four people have treatable mental health issues, but because of the price and the fact that 70 percent of therapists don鈥檛 accept insurance, they don鈥檛 often seek care.

鈥淲e are creating a new mental health system that is rewired around software for affordability,鈥� Adams told 附近上门 News. 鈥淚nsurance administration complexities are built for medical, not one-person practices, so many therapists do not want to take on the burden of accepting insurance.鈥�

Rather, Headway鈥檚 platform enables accepting insurance from patients easier so that therapists can grow their business, he added.

Headway closed on a $32 million in financing, which includes a $26 million Series A and previously raised $4.5 million seed, Adams said. The funding is led by , and and a group of founders from , and .

Market potential

The global behavioral health market is expected to reach $240 billion by 2026, according to a by .

Mental health is a driver for all health care, so the market of behavioral health could eventually be a trillion-dollar market, Adams said. And, from an economic perspective, behavioral health costs more to treat because the person may not have regular checkups or take their medication.

鈥淗eadway isn鈥檛 just mental health. We treat diabetes and cancer because we treat depression for those folks, which helps them to take their oral oncology treatment and their insulin,鈥� he added. 鈥淚t leads to downstream impacts.鈥�

The company is also in a market that is gaining attention from investors. We put together a list of and found 400 that received venture-backed funding within the past five years. In fact, investors pumped $8.6 billion into these companies during that time frame, according to 附近上门 data.

This year, we covered several companies in the mental health space that received funding, including:

• , a health care technology company that raised $2 million in seed funding for treatment-resistant mental health disorders.
• , which raised $3.6 million in seed funding to help women with daily self care.
• , focused on cognitive behavioral therapy, closed a $39 million Series B.
• which raised a $27 million Series B, provides access to in-network behavioral health professionals.

Growth

Meanwhile, Headway is growing in its first market, New York, and is helping tens of thousands of people access therapists and quadrupled the number of therapists accepting insurance, Adams said. Within the market, the company is working with the City of New York and its Metropolitan Transit Authority employees.

The company aims to use the new funding to expand across the United States, gain traction with therapists and commercial insurers and to add to its 30-person workforce to meet all of the new demand.

鈥淲e plan to scale both the team and new geographies, while also partnering with insurance companies,鈥� Adams added. 鈥淲e hope this gives folks an opportunity to address their burning concerns and to solve their mental health access challenges.鈥�

Feature photo of Andrew Adams, co-founder and CEO of Headway, courtesy of Headway
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