Morgan Hewett and Kyle Pierce founded Options MD in April 2020 after they watched a family member battle treatment-resistant depression. After watching him try medication after medication to no avail, they knew there had to be a better way.
30% of people with mental illnesses will not respond to conventional treatments (1). These patients are commonly referred to by the medical community as “treatment-resistant”. In order to alleviate their severe, debilitating depression, they often need cutting-edge treatments, which exist but are extremely difficult to access. On the other hand, cutting-edge treatment providers have difficulty finding the right patients to try the next generation of medications.
Options MD has developed a proprietary treatment and provider matching software to help Americans with treatment-resistant depression finally access treatments that work. Patients interact directly with the software, taking a short assessment and then being able to review personalized treatment and doctor recommendations.
They built a team of medical researchers from institutions like UPenn, Stony Brook University and UCLA as well as technologists from Linkedin and OptumRX. They've received investment from angels like CVS Health's former President and United Healthcare (through their Accelerator with Techstars), and have a waitlist of 1,700 patients with treatment-resistant depression that is growing at 30% MoM. They are currently testing and refining their MVP.
