Savyn - digital PTSD & trauma neuropsychiatry platform

70% of the global population has been exposed to a trauma at least once in their life and 13% of these individuals may develop PTSD (Steel et al., 2009). The global refugee population stood at 26.4 million individuals according to the UNHCR at the end of 2020.76% of Canadians reported experiencing a traumatic event at least once in a lifetime (Ameringen, Mancini & Boyle, 2008) The prevalence of PTSD in Canada remains high at 9.2% (Ameringen et al., 2008), and higher for minority groups, such as Black and Arab Canadians (~10%) (Statistics Canada, 2022). Among those that screen positive for PTSD, these individuals are 2-7 times more likely to report anxiety, depression, suicide ideation and increased drug use symptoms (Government of Canada, 2021). With the recent SARS CoV-2 (COVID-19) pandemic, this number is only expected to rise (Statistics Canada, 2020). Almost 25% of Canadians who met the criteria for PTSD reported their most recent traumatic event occurred during the pandemic (Government of Canada, 2021).

Despite the high prevalence of PTSD in Canada and globally, accessing mental health care to treat trauma and PTSD is a challenge. 82% of those screened positive for PTSD were unable to receive the help they needed due to long wait times (39%), appointment rescheduling (38%) and financial costs (37%) (Statistics Canada, 2022). WHO's Mental Health Atlas 2017, a global assessment of mental health resources and services, it is estimated that less than 10% of people with mental disorders, including PTSD, in low-income countries receive treatment from specialized mental health facilities.

For minority groups in Canada, these barriers may be exacerbated alongside additional barriers they face, such as structural accessibility factors due to living in a new environment and culture. For instance, language barriers and the lack of professional interpreters (Colucci et al., 2015; Subedi et al., 2015) are significant obstacles, as it hinders communication with professionals and further discourages seeking support (Tribe, 2002)

Savyn solves the problem of accessibility by digitizing existing evidence-based PTSD neuropsychiatry treatments on our website, providing access to trauma survivors who fail to get help due to resource shortage of therapists, higher costs and geographic barriers as most healthcare is concentrated in urban centers. We meet UN SDG Goals 3 (Good Health and Wellbeing) and Goal 10 (reducing inequities) by democratizing access to trauma therapies.

Savyn is a proprietary website that is accessed by trauma survivors (patients) with on-call supervision available to assist if needed, using trauma-informed care approach. Our solution assesses the patient's symptoms, records their history and prepares them with grounding tools to be used throughout their subsequent sessions. They come into our application for 8 weeks for 45 minute weekly sessions, where they will do a series of neuroscience based exercises that promotes rewiring of the neurocircuitry to attach less distress to their traumatic incident. Savyn works on both the patient's memory and physiological responses to the trauma, thereby healing holistically. Our current clinical study’s initial data at Sick Kids Research Institute in Toronto shows we improve the patients' PTSD distress symptoms by 65% by the eighth session. There is no coaching or homework requirements from the patient, therefore putting less burden on them to do the work.

We are using full-stack cloud based technology to transform an in-person clinical intervention into a virtual end-to-end digital therapeutics that can be used without human intervention. The application integrates techniques that emphasize trauma-informed care by prioritizing the emotional, psychological and physical safety of the client throughout the treatment

The integration of these techniques in Savyn’s holistic digital therapeutic application ensures the safety of the client in all aspects throughout the treatment process. Our platform can become a game changer in providing effective PTSD intervention and treatment strategies in low income communities and those with geographically limited resources

With 85% of diagnosed PTSD patients not getting access to mental health care (Stats Can) and less than 10% of global communities getting access to mental health care (WHO) and growing refugee crisis due to ongoing conflict and climate change, we address the urgent need to have care that is easily accessed at an affordable rate, positively impacting the lives of people with trauma and PTSD. Our goals align with reducing inequalities and good health and well being of people . With this in mind, the  target audience of the project Includes all equity-seeking groups since these groups are more likely to disproportionately have PTSD due to intersectionality, but also may not receive appropriate and effective means to heal from their trauma due to financial and cultural barriers. Equity-seeking groups including racialized people, women, members of the LGBTQ+ community, indigenous communities, and veterans  are more likely to benefit from a digitized therapeutic platform where they can easily access different tools for healing their trauma. 

Since our solution is a website, there is no travel required to get access to treatment, with the added benefit of reducing the carbon emissions and our carbon footprint of our solution. Many people in remote areas and indigenous communities can access these therapies from the comfort of their homes. 

We will be able to contribute to meaningful changes in the patient’s lives, the communities they live in and reduce the overall mental health cost to the system due to lost productivity by reducing their PTSD symptoms. PTSD symptoms often involve impacts to well-being and quality of life, increased addictions and suicide ideation which our solution can help manage.

Savyn’s impact will include

• Reduced healthcare costs associated with treating PTSD.

• Improved productivity and overall functioning for individuals with PTSD.

• Increased societal support for individuals with PTSD, leading to reduced isolation and increased access to resources.

For health system benefits, based on the stepped care model, Savyn’s digital platform can reduce emergency admissions by reaching those patients on long wait lists or frequently rescheduled appointments. Savyn can shift the delivery of care to primary care so that clinicians and therapists can regularly monitor the progression of their patient through Savyn’s technology without an immediate need for secondary care.

Savyn’s CEO and co-founder Sakeena Mihar, is from the community the venture is serving. She is a survivor of war and an immigrant to Canada and has lived experience with PTSD.  She is a racialized Muslim female who has worked closely with refugee communities as a volunteer. With over 10  years of experience in Tech and Product Management, she aims to make her social enterprise successful and serve the racialized and underrepresented communities, the reason the team has made trauma informed approach a priority.Vic Chiang is the Chief Scientist and co-founder. He’s a neuroscientist and currently a PhD candidate who leads the research activities for the team. He belongs to the LGBTQ+ community who lives with depression. They co-founded  Savyn, as they struggled to access the right help when  needed. They are committed to turn their vision to reality through making trauma support for mental health accessible to all. Matthew Rappard is an experienced tech expert who is the fractional CTO at Savyn.

The team lead has managed to build relationships with organizations serving underrepresented communities in Canada including Amnesty International, Refugee Centre, Pine Foundation, RyePride, and Consent Comes First, among others who provide feedback on the product.

Sakeena Mihar speaks five languages and  our interns and future hires are based on equity and inclusion principles, giving priority to those from underrepresented and racialized communities.Sakeena has spoken to many individuals from the community on a one-on-one basis to get feedback on Savyn’s features. She was able to get around the stigma of speaking about mental health issues in these communities based on her personal relationships and gained insight that has helped Savyn’s user personas. The feedback received has all been positive with many people recommending this project. Sakeena has also spoken at community events in Toronto Metropolitan University and community events, advocating for mental health whenever possible. Sakeena was voted DMZ Women of the Year for 2023. 

Our Board of Directors are EMDR therapists; Don Edwards, Naaz Kassem, Guilin Aydin and Kali Munro who coach and provide feedback on our decisions for product development, market strategy and  provide insights into vulnerable populations who will use them.

Our clinical study has 20 adult patients diagnosed with PTSD have shown the positive outcomes.

We have pilots starting in 3 clinics in the GTA that serve about 300 patients. We are scheduled to run a pilot at St Joe's Hamilton for their Mental Health and Addictions department that served 20,000 patients in 2021-2022.

We are establishing relationships with hospitals in Ontario William Osler Health System in Peel Region, St Michael’s Hospital Toronto. 

Other customers will come through employee benefits programs, veteran organizations, prison rehab programs, and trauma support agencies across Ontario. Our total addressable market includes 952 EMDR therapists in Canada, 1100 trauma therapists in GTA and 131 healthcare, settlement agencies, educational institutes and insurance in the GTA.We will then expand to other provinces/territories, and internationally to refugee camps. 

We hope to expand globally to refugee camps and war-torn countries where PTSD prevalence can be as high as 38%. As the number of people displaced worldwide increases due to natural and man-made disasters, this market will only increase. The COVID-19 pandemic also increased mental health challenges and the need for online PTSD psychotherapies. The global PTSD prevalence post-pandemic is estimated to have increased by 20%. Stable therapeutic options beyond the traditional in-person model will continue to be needed to plan through future crises.

Savyn care beta launched on Aug 2021 with over 70000 visits to date including the use of grounding tools in English, Arabic and Mandarin .

We are hoping to solve the following challenges we are currently facing:

• Savyn currently faces financial barriers due to an appropriate lack of funding to support costs associated with commercialization  and funding research at hospitals for procurements, and updates to our digital platform to support clients and database integrity.

• Our technical platform needs to scale to support the larger number of users onboarding on our platform, including a robust database with security for patient data. We are hoping to receive technical mentorship or peer support to help us determine our technical roadmap to scale.

• We have legal barriers we need to solve to protect the IP of our product, both in Canada and as we scale globally. We require mentorship to help us guide establishing Savyn’s operations globally in a legally appropriate manner. 

• We are in the life sciences and social impact industry, we need better understanding of global life sciences needs including our priority areas of conflict areas where refugees are being hosted in Europe, Middle East and African markets. 

• Cultural and nuanced trauma informed approached for people with trauma is important and a core principle for us. We hope to learn with from other peers and mentors from across the world to solve some of the challenges we are facing. 

Our solution solves access and treatment of PTSD and trauma, by digitizing an evidence based and innovative therapy using neuroscience and eye movements. Savyn platform requires the user to do about eight sessions (once per week, each 45 minutes) identifying their emotions, where they feel them in their physical bodies and rewire the brain using different modalities of eye movements. Savyn's therapy has less burden on the patient as they are not required to do homework or process through talking about their distress too much. This is an adapted therapy based on existing evidence based therapy of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). This is unique as many therapies require users to write down, think through or process their trauma, which can be triggering and lead to the abandonment of treatment. Our initial clinical data shows our treatment can be three times faster than traditional therapies. Our solution has been developed by in-house research with review and feedback from expert trauma therapists in Canada. 

Our current clinical study’s initial data have shown positive outcomes for patients that are on par with in-person therapy. With our platform we can scale services at clinics for more patient throughputs, reduce waiting times for patients and remove barriers to accessing mental health care by providing affordable and faster care. We will be able to contribute to the reduction of the current annual Canadian mental health cost, estimated at 50 billion dollars according to CAMH. Our approach of doing intensive testing with patients and psychotherapists is yielding a therapy protocol that is trauma-informed for better patient outcomes, which all of our clients have appreciated further giving us a competitive advantage, whereas the quality assurance step is foregone by the majority of online wellness apps.

Increase access to trauma and PTSD therapies: This will be measured by the number of clients and trauma patients on our platform.We plan on adding more languages to our platform making it more accessible for different immigrant and refugee communities. We also hope to expand globally to refugee camps and war-torn countries where PTSD prevalence can be as high as 38% and a refugee population that is  79.5 million worldwide. As the number of people displaced worldwide increases due to natural and man-made disasters, this market will only increase. The COVID-19 pandemic also increased mental health challenges and the need for online PTSD psychotherapies. The global PTSD prevalence post-pandemic is estimated to have increased by 20%. Stable therapeutic options beyond the traditional in-person model will continue to be needed to plan through future crises. We will also provide new products including artificial intelligence capabilities and wearables. This will be done by expanding our team for sales, research, and product development.

Reduce PTSD symptoms of users on our platform -  Our current clinical study at Sick Kids Research Institute is yielding positive outcomes for participants diagnosed with PTSD. We measured their symptoms such as sleep, anger, reliving past moments, thoughts of self-harm prior to the study. After using Savyn for about seven to eight weeks , we reduced their symptoms by 65% which is a clinically significant score. Through this evidence based measure we hope to improve the lives of people living with trauma to be able to reframe the trauma, management of their triggers.  Managing their comorbidities such as reduced or non-dependence on substances, preventing suicidal thoughts and better manage their relationships such as better communication and ability to manage emotions

 Increase user participation in society - by managing difficult emotions and reducing PTSD symptoms we hope we are able to help our users achieve the following:

• Find and retain employment therefore reducing economic inequality with better income  

• Continuing education

• Participation in community

• Overall satisfaction and improvement of their quality of life

To measure this we will follow up with surveys and questionnaires six months, one year and two years after using the platform.

Reduce people impacted by trauma and PTSD 

We measure our impact for Good Health and Wellbeing by measuring the number of users, our partnered community organization, outreach and education programs. Through the app we will measure the user interaction with our therapies and record their progress towards their wellness goals based on the user input. We will measure the following qualitative impact metrics using surveys that includes 

  Positive user outcomes to heal PTSD symptoms

• Managing their comorbidities such as reduced or non-dependence on substances

• Positive reframing of trauma 

• Proper management and reduced psychological triggers 

• Preventing suicidal thoughts

• Users ability to manage their relationships such as better communication and ability to manage emotions

      User participation in society   

• Find and retain employment therefore reducing economic inequality with better income  

• Continuing education

• Participation in community

• Overall satisfaction and improvement of their quality of life

PTSD is a common mental health condition  and despite its high prevalence globally, accessing mental care to treat trauma and PTSD is difficult . The high demand for PTSD treatment results in a long waitlist for therapy making it difficult for individuals to receive timely treatment, which when left unaddressed reduces quality of life ,impaired daily functioning and increased risk of suicide.For marginalized and minority communities the challenge further exacerbates due to stigma, discrimination, language barriers, lack of structural accessibility and professional interpreters. Savyn addresses this problem by providing evidence based trauma therapy in a multilingual digital platform that transform an in-person clinical set-up to a virtual end-to-end setting.Such a  transformation reduces the strain on the traditional standard of care and allows mental health supervision for the client when needed , that improves their mental health and well being , increases social inclusion and reduce stigma and discrimination related to PTSD . 

Inputs: Savyn’s digital PTSD therapy program, including software, user interface, and clinical content that are evidence based

Savyn’s Activities:

Users engage with the digital therapy program, completing assessments and exercises to identify and address PTSD symptoms.

Savyn provides evidence-based interventions, such as adapted EMDR and exposure therapy.

Leverages digital technology to increase accessibility and reach for individuals who may not have access to traditional in-person therapy.

Clinical study at Sick Kids Research Institute in Toronto, to evaluate patient outcomes for Savyn’s platform.

Savyn’s Outputs:

The preliminary data of Savyn’s clinical study with 25 adult patients diagnosed with PTSD is yielding positive patient outcomes.The PTSD symptoms for the users dropped by 63%  using our platform and their distress levels dropped to zero from ten (ten being the highest distress). This was measured through validated assessment such as  PTSD checklist for DSM-5(PCL-5),Subject Unit of Distress Scale(SUDS), Depression  and Anxiety(GAD) assessment and Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ) that was found  comparable to in-person one-on-one therapy.  Users report reduced PTSD symptoms and improved quality of life. 

Savyn’s Outcomes:

Improved mental health and well-being for individuals with PTSD.

Increased awareness and acceptance of digital therapy as a viable treatment option for PTSD.

Decreased stigma surrounding PTSD and mental health more broadly.

Savyn’s Impact:

Reduced healthcare costs associated with treating PTSD.

Improved productivity and overall functioning for individuals with PTSD.

Increased societal support for individuals with PTSD, leading to reduced isolation and increased access to resources.

In line with the above outcomes our long term goals anticipates : 

• Percentage increase in access to PTSD treatment in underserved populations, such as remote and marginalized communities through our digital intervention 

• Reduction in drop-out rates from evidence-based PTSD treatment, compared to traditional in-person therapy

• Increase in the percentage of mental health professionals who prescribe digital interventions as part of their treatment plan

• Improved treatment adherence and engagement, with increased user empowerment and self-efficacy in managing their PTSD symptoms

Savyn is a web app that has been developed on React, Javascript and a no SQL database, CouchDB. We hope to scale our current platform to include more robust database frameworks and incorporate virtual reality components in the future, especially for our exposure therapy feature. A logical direction of this initial work will be to incorporate ML/AI processes and procedures into the framework to provide a foundation for predicting success levels based on the characteristics of clients requiring the therapy. This is only possible when data has been captured and can be delivered to ML algorithms for training of AI models.Ultimately, data predictions and results can be shared with medical systems across the country providing a robust approach to refining therapy for clients based on their individual circumstances.

Sakeena Mihar is the founder and CEO of Savyn who has a computer science background and has worked in technology for over 10 years. She is an immigrant Muslim woman of color with the lived experience of PTSD, as she is a survivor of war. Vic Chiang is a neuroscientist and PhD candidate. He is an immigrant man of color from the LGBTQ2+ community who has experienced depression, is the co-founder of Savyn, providing research and scientific support as our Chief Scientist. Their combined experiences as multiply marginalized individuals within the Global North who have faced cultural and language barriers within healthcare have driven them to co-found Savyn and ensure that adequate, equitable care and support is provided to all. For the treatment of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), not only are language and cultural barriers principal factors in explaining the lack of mental healthcare access for immigrants and refugees, but geographic barriers and the general shortage of healthcare resources regarding the limited number of psycho therapists or psychologists. For our clinical validation, we recruited participants from a variety of marginalized communities to ensure we are making human-centered decisions about our products while receiving feedback and results directly from the communities we hope to serve.

Currently, our mission of equity, inclusion, and accessibility is a core principle of Savyn’s operations and goals. Everything we do is through this lens and is reflected throughout our work, whether it is hiring team members, working with clients, we actively seek out underrepresented communities. Our team consists of a group of driven, passionate individuals from underrepresented and racialized communities, such as women of color, immigrants, and LGBTQ2+ members. Furthermore, we are currently formalizing an advisory board composed of mentors also from marginalized communities, including trauma therapists, PTSD researchers, refugee settlement and other social workers, trauma survivors, and organizations such as Amnesty International, Toronto Metropolitan University’s Office of Sexual Violence, and Syria Lifeline.  

Our business model is B2B. This includes a hybrid pricing model, consisting of an enterprise subscription model for our B2B partners.  We are tentatively pricing our platform at 150 CAD per user per year on a licensing model to our B2B partners. This fee is affordable for both the users and the B2B partners, where current session for therapy is CAD 180 and up, for a single session, with clients needing atleast12 sessions to see improvements in their wellbeing, which puts the current costs at CAD 2160.

Our business model includes tiered pricing with an anticipated sales revenue of ~$10 million within 3 years based on our market share.From our B2B business model, there are 952 EMDR therapists, 150 agencies, and institutes we can collaborate with. There are over 150 clinics and agencies that serve this population in Ontario alone which is our immediate target market. . Our initial clients are hospitals, private clinics, social organizations and Toronto Metropolitan University. We will be approaching other B2B partners such as CamH, Toronto General, Women’s College, Royal Ottawa Mental Health Center. The second wave of paying customers will come through insurance companies, employee benefits programs, veteran organizations, prison rehab programs, universities, colleges and other trauma support agencies who will become our paying partners, with a tiered licensing fee.

We hope to expand globally to refugee camps and war-torn countries where PTSD prevalence can be as high as 38%. As the number of people displaced worldwide increases due to natural and man-made disasters, this market will only increase. The COVID-19 pandemic also increased mental health challenges and the need for online PTSD psychotherapies. The global PTSD prevalence post-pandemic is estimated to have increased by 20%. Stable therapeutic options beyond the traditional in-person model will continue to be needed to plan through future crises.

Our funding plans include raising capital through grants in Ontario and Canada. We have applied for various programs in Canada for a total of 100,000 CAD, this is through i.d.e.a fund, Mitacs research funding, Healthi and Sophie funding. This will get us through the inflection point for commercialization of our product with hospitals in the Ontario and GTA. We’ve also applied for funding through Singapore Management University’s pitch competition with a prize money of 100,000 Singapore dollars which will help us with expansion into Asian markets.

We are also currently raising capital through a pre-seed angel investor round, for a total of 150,000 CAD. This will help us build a scalable technology to scale the growing customers and business partners with more patient data security and features.

We are also running pilots with a few pilots to run as paid pilot with our partner, which is under discussion. Our future plan is to generate revenue with our B2B customers both in Canada and globally. We provide Savyn directly to other organizations as we follow the B2B model. Our initial clients are hospitals, private clinics, social organizations and paying customers who would come through insurance companies, employee benefits programs, veteran organizations, prison rehab programs, universities, colleges and other trauma support agencies who will become our paying partners, with a tiered licensing fee.

We have raised CAD $160,900 so far from the following sources:

• Government of Canada - $38,400

• Mitacs research funding - $7500

• RVC grant - $50,000 

• Penny Appeal Social Accelerator Fund - $10,000

• Amex DMZ Fellowship - $10,000

• Toronto Metropolitan Univeristy - Brampton Ventures Zone Fellowship - $20,000

• Ontario BioScience Innovation Organization (OBIO)  BDSP - $25,000