Jeffrey Clark, M.D., has been developing application programs since he was a kid, tinkering on his Tandy computer. In recent years, the University of Washington psychiatry resident has turned his attention to developing programs to help people with mental illness.
He launched a mobile app in 2014 called CBT Keeper, which teaches basic cognitive restructuring skills to people with depression or anxiety, and last year, he created an online cognitive-behavioral therapy program for insomnia (CBT-I) called Slumber Camp. Slumber Camp earned Clark the grand prize at APA’s Innovation Lab at the 2017 Annual Meeting.
Slumber Camp is an online, 28-lesson course delivered periodically to users through an email link so the program can be accessed through multiple platforms. By creating a routine in which opening an email leads to engaging content and simple “to-do” lists, it creates a chance to “hook” users the way television shows can, Clark said.
While online CBT-I is not novel, existing programs are often sterile in tone, expensive, and/or buggy, Clark said. “We need something that is human, affordable, and maybe even a little fun,” he told Psychiatric News.
Clark plans to deliver CBT-I lessons to Slumber Camp users with a tone that is lighthearted and language that is easy to follow, while staying true to the fundamentals of CBT-I. “Slumber Camp is aggressively focused on sleep restriction and stimulus control, the foundation of effective CBT-I,” he said.
Clark plans to launch Slumber Camp by late summer/early fall and find a sustainable marketing approach that can help him build up interest and subscribers gradually. To attract interest in Slumber Camp, Clark must promote not only the product but also the benefits of CBT-I therapy compared with sleep medications, which are meant to be only a short-term approach.
Clark said he was encouraged by the connections he formed with a wide range of tech leaders and thinkers as part of his involvement with Innovation Lab. “I wasn’t quite sure what to expect,” said Clark, who was encouraged to submit his pitch by colleagues at the University of Washington. “But it was nice to find a new audience for my program and see this innovation community forming in our field.
“And it was especially valuable to meet people who have turned ideas to successful and scalable interventions,” Clark added. He has been doing some informal networking for a while and has met lots of people with great concepts or business plans, but no one who has gone on to market success. That’s important in the digital space, which is constantly flush with new programs that will rarely see a return on investment. ■
