Digital addiction treatment provider Affect Therapeutics raked in $16 million of Series A financing, which it will use to grow its footprint, the startup announced Wednesday.

McLean, Virginia-based Affect Therapeutics leverages its app to support patients struggling with alcohol and drug addiction — including for methamphetamine, cocaine, cannabis and prescription stimulants — across a range of severity levels. It offers group and individual therapy, addiction psychiatry, support for social factors like housing and employment, prescription medications to curb cravings and tracking through its app. It receives revenue through contracts with payers, specifically commercial health plans and Medicaid. These insurer customers include UnitedHealthcare, Aetna, Humana, Molina and Centene.

The $16 million Series A funding round was led by ARTIS Ventures and included participation from AlleyCorp, CityLight, LifeArc Ventures, Samsung Next and What If Ventures. In total, Affect Therapeutics has raised about $26 million, said Kristin Muhlner, co-founder and CEO of the company.

With the financing, the startup will work to expand its presence nationally. Affect Therapeutics is currently serving patients in 12 states, and will expand to six more this year. It plans to work in all 50 states by early 2025 at the latest, Muhlner said. In addition to expanding its footprint, the company will also invest in growing its clinical team, improving its technology and data analytics capabilities and growing its research on addiction treatment.

Affect Therapeutics launched in 2020 after Muhlner and co-founder Jeff DeFlavio recognized the need for additional addiction treatment services, a gap that a digital solution could help fill. About 46 million people struggle with a substance use disorder, but only 10% are able to access treatment.

“I have lost someone very dear to me to an overdose and it was those early days of the pandemic when I think many of us were sort of wondering what our real purpose in life should be,” Muhlner said in an interview. “As we talked about this opportunity and what we saw, we both became very convinced there was both a huge need and a huge gap in the landscape that we can fill.”

When consumers start with Affect Therapeutics, they have a virtual intake session with a counselor, who collects their medical history. After that, they begin meeting with their therapy group and doctor for medical psychiatric needs. They also start tracking their progress in the app. Users continue meeting with their therapy group twice a week and their counselor once a week. They also complete urine drug screenings weekly and/or do daily breathalyzer screenings. The company ships the breathalyzers and drug screenings to patients’ homes.

Affect Therapeutics incentivizes people to stay in treatment through a behavioral therapy called contingency management, in which individuals are rewarded for positive behavioral change. These rewards range from 10 cents for completing small challenges on the app to $15 for achieving a streak tied to consistently testing drug and/or alcohol-free. 

“We reward someone for participation in treatment, most notably for the provision of negative drug and alcohol screens,” Muhlner said. “In doing that, we create a dopamine response that over time we hope is pleasurable enough to habituate that behavior.”

Other digital companies that treat patients struggling with addiction include DynamiCare Health, which also uses contingency management, and Boulder Care, which offers medication for addiction treatment, clinical support and peer support.

Photo: sorbetto, Getty Images