#82 - Eating Disorders - Prevalence, and Lack of Solutions with Courage Therapeutics Founder Dan Housman
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
Release Date: 04/23/2021
#92 - Jane Technologies Founder Soc Rosenfeld on the Future of Cannabis Retail Tech
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
What is the future of legal cannabis from a retail / e-commerce perspective? Today's guest, Socrates Rosenfeld, Co-Founder and CEO of Jane Technologies explains. Jane is an e-commerce solution for the Cannabis space that supports nearly 3,000 dispensaries and handles more than 20% of the legal Cannabis transactions in the U.S. each year.
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#91 - Modern Health Co-Founder and CEO Alyson Watson
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
Alyson Watson is CEO and co-founder of Modern Health, a mental health unicorn! Modern Health is a global mental health benefits solution for employers that covers the spectrum of mental wellbeing needs from tech enabled solutions to professional support solutions on one platform.
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#90 - Spring Health CEO April Koh - On Building a Mental Health Unicorn
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
April Koh is the youngest female founder to ever take a startup from just an idea to unicorn status. We are so excited that she’s accomplished this in the mental health space, and we are excited for you to meet her and learn more about her Company, Spring Health! For those who may not be familiar, Spring Health is a provider of mental health benefits to employers for their employees, and their employees’ families.
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#89 - The Future of Precision Psychiatry with Dr. Amit Etkin of Alto Neuroscience
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
Dr. Amit Etkin is pioneering a revolution in the way mental health medications are designed, developed, prescribed, and brought to market. Precision psychiatry is the future of mental health treatment and Dr. Etkin is leading the way with his drug development platform, Alto Neuroscience. In this episode, Dr. Etkin explains why psychiatric drugs have failed, what he is doing about it and why it will work.
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#88 - _able Partners Founding Partner Amanda Eilian - A Pioneer in Mental Health Investing
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
Amanda Eilian, Founding Partner of _able Partners joins us to talk all things mental health startup investing. _able Partners is an early-stage VC firm supporting visionary founders in the positive living space. Their investments focus on companies that improve the daily lives of people, making them healthier, happier, and making their lives more meaningful. Some specific investment areas include mental health, addiction, women’s health, sexual wellness, & coaching among others.
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#87 - Brain Computer Interfaces - A Primer with John Donoghue
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
Today’s guest is John Donoghue. He is well known for his groundbreaking work developing Brain Computer Interfaces (BCIs) to restore movement for people with paralysis, known as ‘BrainGate’. BrainGate was the original BCI system created by a company called Cyberkinetics, of which John was a co-founder.
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#86 - Elyse Cohen - VP Social Impact at Rare Beauty by Selena Gomez
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
Today’s guest is Elyse Cohen, VP of Social Impact and Inclusion at Rare Beauty by Selena Gomez. Elyse is an expert on purpose driven brands, social impact, and has been hand selected by Selena Gomez to lead the impact efforts at Rare Beauty. Previously Elyse worked at the White House for First Lady Michelle Obama as Deputy Director of the Let’s Move effort. She has worked on social impact and policy initiatives at the Public Health Institute and in a variety of other social impact roles.
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#85 - Measuring Mental Health with Ksana Health Co-Founder Nick Allen
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
You can’t fix what you don’t measure. Measurement and testing of our mental health lags the same capabilities in physical health care. Dr. Nick Allen, our guest today, is building a mental health measurement solution for clinical use. Today we talk to him about the challenges, and opportunity for his startup, Ksana Health.
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#84 - Veterans Mental Health with Dr. Anthony Hassan, CEO of Cohen Veterans Network
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
Dr. Anthony Hassan, President and CEO of the Cohen Veterans Network (CVN) joins us today. CVN is a network of 25 non-profit mental health clinics providing care to veterans and their families. The facilities are located in or around historically dense veteran and active duty military communities.
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#83 - Psychedelic Treatment Cured My Alcohol Addiction - Jon Kostakopoulos
Stigma Podcast - Mental Health
Jon Kostakopoulos was the first study participant in the NYU Psilocybin clinical trial. After years of struggling with alcoholism and after trying other options including in-patient programs, out-patient programs, AA, and pharmaceutical treatments, nothing was working for him. Finally, at age 25, Jon joined the clinical trial and underwent three different Psilocybin treatment sessions and has not craved alcohol since his first treatment session.
info_outlineToday’s guest is Dan Housman. He’s the co-founder and CTO of Courage Therapeutics. We met Dan when he came through our first cohort of the What If Fellowship Program. His startup is a biopharma drug development business focused on eating disorders (anorexia nervosa specifically).
You can connect with Dan here: LinkedIn, Courage Therapeutics Website
Links mentioned in the show: NEDA, Feast, Daniel Le Grange Research
What If Fellowship Program: https://whatif.vc/
HERE ARE SOME THINGS WE TALKED ABOUT
- Dan tells us about the history of Courage Therapeutics and why his personal experience surrounding eating disorders inspired him to use his background in molecular biology to find a solution to this problem.
- We discuss the state of the market and current solutions available for eating disorders. Dan shares some of the reasons that he believes these current treatments only do so much.
- We discuss the drug that he has been working on developing, the effects that it is meant to have on those who struggle with anorexia, and Dan shares his hope that it can help to reduce the need for more severe treatment options.
- We talk about where Courage Therapeutics is at in the drug development timeline and what the next steps are to make sure that this drug will work and that it will be available as soon as safely possible.
- We discuss the statistics around eating disorders, specifically anorexia nervosa, and what this problem looks like in the United States, but also globally. Dan also shares that it’s not about how big the numbers are that necessarily make a product successful. There are many contributing factors.
- Dan shares about the stigma that surrounds eating disorders and why people are feeling unable to talk about them more.
- Dan shares resources for those who are interested in knowing more about eating disorders, who want to find resources to help themselves or a loved one who may be struggling with anorexia, and for general research papers around the topic itself.
Connect with the Stigma Podcast in the following ways: What If Fellowship, Patreon, Website, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Email
Connect with host Stephen Hays here: Stephen Hays Personal Website, Twitter, LinkedIn, What If Ventures (Mental Health Venture Fund)