Rootd #1 App for Anxiety, Panic w/ Ania Wysocka

Future of Psychiatry! Innovations in Mental Health

We had the pleasure of speaking with Ania Wysocka, who is the founder of Rootd, an extremely popular app that is designed to help individuals with anxiety and panic attacks. Ania developed the app when she had experienced panic attacks and found no app that felt suitable for her. Guided by her original mission to develop an app that was practical and easy to use for her demographic, Rootd is a fun (Ron!) yet scientifically sound app that incorporates many fundamental principles of anxiety treatment. Despite the easy temptation to embrace its scientific validity and claim its a one-stop-shop for treatment, she describes the app as fitting in symbiotically with the therapist-patient relationship, and notes the app regularly also encourages users to seek therapy as well. She strikes a balance between astute listening of her user base in incorporating more features, yet wanting to be focused on her mission and not overextend, for example into AI, prematurely, “It’s really important to know exactly what we are sharing with users and to not have to kind of be in control of that, because with other tools, you might have a suggested response,” via an AI model. Ania also understands the importance of data privacy in mental health apps. Fear of privacy concerns would inhibit a user from embracing certain core features, such as journaling. Understanding the importance of this, she notes “all of that data is stored locally, so we don’t actually see any of that. That’s completely private for the user.”

Host: Bruce Bassi MD
More resources, including a full transcript, can be found at our podcast website: https://www.telepsychhealth.com/futurepsychiatrypodcast/
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As always, the content is for educational purposes and is not medical advice. If you are having a medical or psychiatric emergency please contact 911.

Chapters

1. Preview (00:00:00)

2. Ania's Background (00:01:37)

3. How did you get started? (00:02:45)

4. What was the beginning of Rootd like? (00:05:00)

5. What does Rootd mean? (00:06:55)

6. What is the trajectory of a typical user? (00:09:35)

7. What is your favorite part of the app? (00:11:10)

8. What are the next features? (00:12:27)

9. Seeking FDA approval? (00:13:39)

10. Specific features working on? (00:15:23)

11. Why are clinicians referring patients? (00:16:35)

12. Incorporate clinician dashboard? (00:18:26)

13. Any misconceptions? (00:20:44)

14. How does Rootd help relationships with therapists? (00:23:08)