What is the name of your organization?
Kahani
What is the name of your solution?
Kahani
Provide a one-line summary or tagline for your solution.
Kahani is a digital recovery companion delivering daily, personalized support for eating disorder recovery between and beyond treatment.
In what city, town, or region is your solution team headquartered?
San Francisco, CA, USA
In what country is your solution team headquartered?
United States
What type of organization is your solution team?
For-profit, including B-Corp or similar models
Film your elevator pitch.
What specific problem are you solving?
Eating disorders affect 9% of the U.S. population, with approximately 10,200 annual deaths—one every 52 minutes—making it the second deadliest mental illness. According to Harvard research, these disorders impose a significant economic burden, estimated at $64.7 billion annually in healthcare costs, lost productivity, and informal care. Despite the prevalence, treatment remains inaccessible for many. Only 20% of affected individuals receive care, leaving 80% without support due to high costs, stigma, and a shortage of specialized providers.
Inpatient treatment costs range from $80,000 to $250,000 per patient (UCSD data), and outpatient care is often episodic, lacking continuity or personalization. The average wait time for treatment is five months, and the relapse rate after treatment is as high as 75%.
According to the National Eating Disorder Association (NEDA), marginalized populations, including people of color and LGBTQ+ youth, face even greater disparities. Women of color are half as likely to be diagnosed or treated, and LGBTQ+ youth with eating disorders are nearly four times more likely to attempt suicide. These gaps exacerbate health inequities and perpetuate high mortality and morbidity rates.
What is your solution?
Kahani is a personalized recovery platform designed to bridge the critical gap between treatment programs and sustained out-patient recovery. Traditional options, including residential and intensive outpatient programs, provide essential care but are time constrained and financially draining for most, leaving patients vulnerable post-discharge when they transition to outpatient-only support. Many struggle with relapse due to the lack of structured follow-up, accountability, and continuous therapeutic engagement.
Kahani dynamically adapts micro-therapy tasks to patients’ unique goals, behaviors, and progress, ensuring each person has an individualized roadmap for emotional regulation, cognitive reframing, and self-compassion. We also foster a strong sense of community by connecting users with peers and medical professionals, reinforcing accountability and reducing isolation—key relapse risk factors.
Unlike clinical, transactional recovery apps, Kahani is immersive, gamified, and visually engaging, transforming recovery into a continuous, motivating experience. By combining adaptive personalization, structured support, and community reinforcement, Kahani ensures recovery extends beyond traditional care and at a fraction of the cost – empowering individuals to sustain progress long-term.
Who does your solution serve, and in what ways will the solution impact their lives?
Kahani serves young people—primarily adolescents and young adults—who are navigating recovery from eating disorders and are often left unsupported after treatment ends. This includes individuals who have transitioned out of residential or intensive outpatient programs and face heightened relapse risks due to long waitlists, high costs, and a lack of ongoing care. Our solution especially focuses on underserved groups, including BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ youth, who are statistically twice as likely to experience eating disorders but half as likely to be diagnosed or treated.
Kahani addresses these gaps by providing daily, personalized micro-therapy tasks that adapt to each user’s needs, triggers, and progress. The platform offers a recovery roadmap rooted in evidence-based frameworks like CBT, DBT, and ACT, enabling users to build skills in emotional regulation and cognitive reframing. Clinicians also use Kahani to track patient progress and tailor their care. Unlike clinical apps that feel transactional or self-care apps that lack depth, Kahani is interactive, immersive, and designed to reduce isolation and increase continuity of care. For users who feel abandoned after treatment, Kahani offers accountability, connection, and an empowering recovery experience that meets them where they are—emotionally, financially, and culturally.
