Trinity Health is partnering with Orexo to provide digital therapeutics to Trinity Health patients. Dennis Urbaniak is Executive vice president of digital therapeutics at Orexo. He says these web-based treatments use behavioral therapy techniques to help people make behavior and lifestyle changes.
"They're driven by evidence, meaning clinical trials that show their effectiveness. They're overseen from a regulatory point of view by the FDA and they also meet specific privacy and legal standards around patient data and patient information. It's really fascinating, think of it as software as medicine and in our space we work in mental health and substance use disorder."
Trinity Health is offering Deprexis and Vorvida to help patients manage depression and excessive drinking.
Urbaniak says the partnership with Trinity health will allow them to serve rural populations in parts of North Dakota and Montana.
"If you think about the footprint, they serve a really large geographic area. Our therapies complement the providers, they never replace the providers. We're always adjunct to them, but patients can access the therapies through any web-connected browser on any device and they have access to them 24/7."
Urbaniak says the digital therapeutics programs can be useful for people who are hesitant to get the help they need because of the stigma associated with mental health and substance use disorders.
"We are not in any way intending to replace face- to-face therapy, but in a lot of cases, access to a face to face therapist can be challenging. Even if you have access to a therapist, things happen outside the time you see them, so the great thing about our therapies, is if a trigger occurs or something like that, you have a way to access the therapy whenever you need it."