A year ago, more than 13% of adults said they had started or increased drug use in response to the pandemic. Centers for Disease Prevention and Control. As face-to-face plans for substance use are shelved, more and more people are turning to telemedicine.
Seeing demand, Quit Genius, a startup that provides an app-based smoking cessation program, expanded to alcohol use and substance use disorders last year.It recently raised $64 million jointly led by Kinnevik and Atomico, and plans to use it for expansion in the United States
Quit Genius was co-founded in 2017 by three doctors in the UK: Drs. Yusuf Sherwani, Maroof Ahmed and Sarim Siddiqui. The company’s chief executive, Chevani, said at a press conference that they designed it as “a plan we want us as doctors to have.”
All of its projects will combine behavioral therapy through telemedicine with approved drugs and connected devices. For example, its smoking cessation plan includes a connected breath analyzer to measure nicotine levels, app-based exercises, guidance, and access to nicotine gum or patches.
A randomized controlled trial of its smoking cessation application found that 44.5% of its users had not smoked recently after 4 weeks of quitting, compared with 28.7% in the control group.The results are Published on JMIR last year.
The company has seen significant growth in recent months. The company said its revenue has increased tenfold last year, and it now works with 55 employers and health plans to cover 2.1 million lives.
With the new funding, Quit Genius also plans to expand its telemedicine coverage, although the regulations on telemedicine coverage and the ability to remotely prescribe drugs are still in a state of uncertainty.
“In the short term, we are actively expanding our supplier network to cover the entire U.S. population in all 50 states,” Sherwani said. “Our goal is to allow everyone to receive evidence-based treatment for tobacco, alcohol and opioid addiction on their own terms.”
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