Clinical trials have shown that PsychologyOnline’s method of delivering therapy in real time with a live therapist is fast, effective and convenient. In addition, patients can attend sessions from the comfort of home at a time that suits them, including evenings and weekends.
Rapid access to the service provides timely support when it is needed, not after the situation escalates. Patients can access therapy with an appropriate specialist (including language) in a few days compared with waits of several months for NHS face-to-face services.
The societal benefits of the service and its strong business case have persuaded Imperial Innovations to invest alongside angel investors from Cambridge Angels, ClearlySo and Harvard Business School Alumini of London.
Susan Searle, Chief Executive Officer at Imperial Innovations says, “We are excited to back PsychologyOnline at this point in its development, and consider it a great example of the use of digital and online technologies to improve patient access to healthcare services. We look forward to a time when all patients can rapidly access the proven, convenient and effective service that PsychologyOnline offers.”
PsychologyOnline CEO Barnaby Perks says, “PsychologyOnline is already available to NHS patients in some areas. For example, we were recently commissioned in a three year contract to deliver therapy to patients referred by GPs across the county of Surrey. This investment will help us to develop our service and offer it more widely. We are also developing our private offering to support people who are reluctant to visit their GP and want a more discreet and confidential service.”
Cognitive behavioural therapy is used widely in NHS mental health services as a NICE-recommended treatment for anxiety and depression. The therapy aims to help people manage their problems by changing the way they think and feel about certain situations or events. Such is the demand however that there can often be a long wait to see a therapist.
PsychologyOnline’s network of qualified and accredited therapists deliver sessions at any time of day, including evenings and weekends. The service is delivered via a text-based instant messaging conversation in a secure online meeting room. The use of text not only makes the system simple to use but also helps patients to overcome stigma and inhibition, enabling them to disclose personal thoughts and feelings much more readily than they would in face-to-face encounters, leading to faster recovery.
The effectiveness of PsychologyOnline was demonstrated in a 300 patient clinical trial published in The Lancet in 2009. An average of just six sessions of online therapy was needed for recovery from moderate to severe depression. Follow up client assessments at four and eight months confirmed that the benefits were maintained.
GP and mental health researcher at Bristol University Dr David Kessler says, “Part of the current problem is that there are simply not enough NHS psychologists to meet the demand for talking therapies. Considerable thought should be given to wider adoption of an online system that makes more efficient use of our pool of psychologists and could provide the critical and timely intervention that would allow people to recover faster.”
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PsychologyOnline backed with £0.5m investment from Imperial Innovations
25 June 2013
Depression costs the UK £9bn a year in loss of earnings and yet it is considered to be both preventable and treatable. PsychologyOnline, a Cambridge-based company offering clinically-proven online cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT), has received new investment, including £500,000 from leading UK healthcare investor Imperial Innovations, to develop and extend its service in response to increasing demand.