Hi friend,
Australian business Kantoko raised $3.5M to expand its ADHD platform. The TMS company, BrainsWay, reported impressive Q2 earnings and one of its investments, Neurolief, began supplying two neuromodulation therapies through a new VA contract.
In the UK, Wales secured £3.4M to evaluate an open access model of mental healthcare.
If you’re interested in the impact of AI tools on clinical outcomes, make sure to read the latest research from Spring Health. Or if you’re more drawn to the intersection of pop culture and mental health, check out the latest news from Wondermind, Selena Gomez’s mental health business.
Let’s get into it!
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What happened in mental health last week?
Industry News:
⏺️ Kantoko raised $3.5M to expand its ADHD assessment and treatment platform in Australia. The Sydney-based startup offers a monthly subscription to help people manage their ADHD. They charge $200 for the first month and $100 a month after that, which gives users access to an initial ADHD assessment, up to six standard appointments a year, prescription renewal, and ongoing access to care tools, records and its support team. (link)
⏺️ Arab Therapy raised $2M to build an Arabic-first AI mental health platform. The Berlin-founded company, run by Jordanian founders, provides AI-powered tools, a content library, and online therapy sessions with licensed specialists, tailored to Arabic-speaking users. (link)
⏺️ BrainsWay reported impressive Q2 earnings, with record revenue. BrainsWay had another breakout quarter, with revenue up 35% to $17.1M and adjusted EBITDA up 141% to $3.5M. Record system shipments, rising utilisation and expanding reimbursement drove growth, and the company raised its full-year outlook. BrainsWay shares are up more than 150% in the past year. You can read a full analysis of BrainsWay’s performance in our Mental Health Market Report. (link)
⏺️ Definium Therapeutics' LSD-based drug hit its primary endpoint in a second Phase 3 trial, this time for generalised anxiety disorder. The Voyage trial gave 214 adults with GAD a single 100 microgram dose of DT120, an orally disintegrating LSD tablet, or placebo; anxiety scores fell 11.6 points on average in the treatment group versus 6.2 points on placebo at 12 weeks, with 43% of the treatment group seeing at least a 50% symptom reduction compared with 16% on placebo. No new safety signals were reported, though marked differences in side effects between arms suggest many participants could likely tell which treatment they'd received. The company is targeting a US regulatory filing in the first half of 2027. (link)
⏺️ Neurolief began supplying two prescription neuromodulation therapies to veterans through a new VA contract. Multiple VA medical centers are now prescribing Proliv Rx, an at-home device for depression that hasn't responded adequately to antidepressants, and Relivion MG, for acute migraine treatment. Both are self-administered at home under physician supervision, extending care to veterans who face barriers to frequent in-clinic visits. BrainsWay is a strategic investor in Neurolief. (link)
⏺️ Adaptyx Biosciences and Attune Neurosciences launched an ARPA-H-funded study to find an objective biomarker for chronic pain. The $4M, 24-month study will use Adaptyx's wearable biosensing platform to continuously monitor five biomarkers in 100 adults with chronic pain, with an emphasis on US military veterans. Attune Neurosciences is developing an at-home wearable for MRI-guided deep brain stimulation. (link)
⏺️ Jake Collective and the JED Foundation launched a multiyear partnership to support neurodivergent students' mental health. The nonprofits will identify schools willing to pilot new support frameworks and gather input from neurodivergent students, caregivers and educators on what works and what's missing from current provision. Neurodivergent young people are significantly more likely to experience anxiety, depression, social isolation and suicidal ideation than their neurotypical peers, and roughly 30% of Americans under 30 self-identify as neurodivergent. (link)
⏺️ The VA launched a new clinical trial testing psilocybin for veterans with treatment-resistant depression. The trial is the VA's 20th active clinical trial exploring psychedelic-assisted therapies for mental health conditions, part of a broader push under new VA leadership since early 2026 to prioritise research into emerging treatments. The VA is separately running trials of MDMA for PTSD and GLP-1 drugs for alcohol use disorder. These trials are backed by more than $23M in external funding from the VA's Office of Research and Development. (link)
⏺️ New York committed $21M to expand psychiatric emergency programmes across the state. The funding will establish three new Comprehensive Psychiatric Emergency Programs, which offer 24/7 crisis services and up to 72 hours of extended observation, in the Bronx, Hudson Valley and Northern New York, plus upgrades to four existing programmes elsewhere in the state. New York's 21 existing programmes received more than 110,000 visits between February 2025 and January 2026. (link)
⏺️ Wales secured £3.4M to evaluate its shift to open-access mental health services nationwide. The four-year study, funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research, will assess a new model where people can access mental health support without a referral or wait, aiming to become the first country to test open-access mental health care at national scale. Researchers will use Wales's SAIL Databank to compare service use before and after the change, drawing on ten years of linked health records. (link)
⏺️ Investors sued Selena Gomez, her mother and a co-founder over the collapse of mental health startup Wondermind. The lawsuit alleges the trio misrepresented Wondermind's infrastructure, partnerships and leadership to investors, who put in nearly $1.2M based on a $95M valuation in 2022, and concealed the company's problems for three years until a 2025 investigative report exposed internal disarray. Promised partnerships, advertising deals and an app never materialised, according to the complaint. Gomez’s attorney, Mathew Rosengart, and the company’s co-founder, Daniella Pierson, have denied the allegations. (link)
⏺️ A Nature Medicine feature reported that drugmakers are increasingly targeting sleep pathways to treat chronic disease, including depression. Once viewed mainly as a symptom of illness, disrupted sleep is increasingly understood as a modifiable driver of chronic conditions ranging from pain to depression, prompting pharmaceutical interest in sleep as a treatment target rather than just something to manage. (link)
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Research News:
⏺️ A real-world study from Spring Health found that adding AI features to therapy was linked to slightly better engagement and mental health outcomes. Researchers compared 26,208 adults receiving therapy through Spring Health: some had access to AI-assisted intake, session summaries and takeaways, while others received therapy without these features. Those with AI access attended 5% more therapy sessions in the first seven weeks and returned for their second session about 0.6 days sooner. They also showed modestly faster improvements in depression and anxiety symptoms. The study was observational rather than randomised, so it cannot prove the AI features caused the improvements. (link)
⏺️ A study of Character.AI users found that people who mainly used the chatbot for companionship tended to have lower psychological well-being, particularly if they had fewer real-life social connections. Researchers surveyed 1,131 US adults and analysed 4,664 chat sessions. Among people using the chatbot for companionship, heavier use and sharing more personal information were linked to lower well-being. However, the study does not prove causation: people with lower well-being may simply be more likely to turn to AI for companionship. (link)
⏺️ A study testing nine AI models found that their scores on a suicide-intervention test could change significantly depending on how the test was run. Researchers generated 27,000 responses using the SIRI-2, a test of suicide-intervention skills. Scores changed substantially depending on the instructions given to the AI, and all nine models consistently overrated clinically inappropriate responses that sounded supportive. The researchers warn that the same benchmark score can support very different claims depending on what is considered good clinical behaviour, what the test can actually measure, and how the AI was configured. They argue that better clinical measurement expertise is needed as benchmark results are increasingly used to make claims about AI mental health safety that may not be accurate. (link)
⏺️ A large Australian study found that people with schizophrenia-spectrum or bipolar disorder developed multiple chronic physical health problems earlier and at much higher rates than other hospital patients. Researchers followed 178,665 people, including 30,189 with schizophrenia-spectrum or bipolar disorders. The difference between the groups grew as physical illness became more extensive: those with these mental health conditions had 1.85 times the rate of developing chronic disease in at least one body system, rising to 3.16 times the rate for disease affecting five or more systems. The differences were greatest among younger people, highlighting the need for earlier physical health prevention and screening alongside mental health care. (link)
⏺️ A systematic review found that we know surprisingly little about whether social interventions for mental illness work equally well for different groups of people. Researchers reviewed 266 studies of support with issues such as employment, housing, social connection and finances. Only 8% of papers reported whether outcomes differed by gender, ethnicity/race or socioeconomic position, and none looked at people belonging to multiple marginalised groups. Reporting of ethnicity and socioeconomic circumstances was also inconsistent or often missing. The review concludes that the evidence is heavily focused on urban, higher-income countries and often cannot tell us who benefits most—or who may be missing out—from social interventions. The authors say services should build in better data collection to close this gap. Doing so will be important for convincing stakeholders to adopt such interventions. (link)
⏺️ A Lancet comment argued psychiatry and neurology should adopt a joint classification of disorders. The authors argue that treating mental and neurological illness as separate categories, reflected in how patients are diagnosed and treated across different clinics and specialties, is no longer justified given growing evidence for the interdependence of brain and mind. They propose that a joint classification of neurological and psychiatric disorders is theoretically sound, practically achievable, and would benefit patients on both sides of the current divide. (link)
That’s all for this week.
Keep fighting the good fight!
Steve Duke
Founder of Hemingway
P.S. If you find these updates valuable, consider becoming a Hemingway Pro Member. As a Pro Member, you will get access to even deeper industry insights and will be invited to join our community of over 500 mental health leaders.
