Array Behavioral Care-Virtual Psychiatry and Therapy Across the Continuum

The Driver:

Array Behavioral Care recently raised $25 million in its series C round. The round was led by CVS Health with participation from existing investors Wells Fargo Strategic Capital, Harbour Point Capital, Health Velocity Capital, HLM Venture Partners, OSF Healthcare, and OCA Ventures. Array Behavioral Care provides therapy and telepsychiatry-based virtual care for patients with behavioral health concerns and mental health issues. This new series of funding will help to scale their brand and platform as well as grow their team and improve their tech. This will help to expand their services overall into brand new markets and help to reach Americans suffering and in need of mental health services and overall high-quality behavioral health care.

Key Takeaways:

• There are over 6,300 areas in America that lack access to mental health provider care with those areas covering over 15O M Americans (VMG Health)

• The number of Americans stating that they use telehealth services for mental healthcare rose 10%, to 59% between 2020 and 2021 (Cross River Therapy)

• Approximately, 50% of Americans will be diagnosed with a mental illness at some point in their life and 1 in 25 Americans are currently living with a mental illness (CDC)

• Close to 25 percent of respondents reported they are not able to receive the treatment they need for their mental health conditions due to lack of services, shortages in psychiatrists, and lack of mental health workers (Mental Health America)

The Story:

Array Behavioral Care was founded in 1999 in New Jersey by chief medical officer and co-founder Dr. James Varrell. As noted on the company’s website, Dr. Varrell was an early advocate for telepsychiatry and began writing the business plan for the predecessor to Array, InSight Telepsychiatry while working as a psychiatrist, with the help of his friend Geoffrey Boyce (current CEO and co-founder of Array) who wrote the business plan. In 2019 Insight TelePsychiatry joined forces with Regroup Telehealth another telepsychiatry provider in the Chicago, IL area. Together they became the largest telepsychiatry service clinician organization in the country.

In January 2021 the companies relaunched under the name Array Behavioral Care. Varrell's vision was to modify and provide better access to telehealth psychiatry care. He also wanted to focus on better access for patients living in underserved communities as well as remote areas around the country. He believes in order to help counter the provider shortage and increasing mental health crisis in the population, his company is necessary because of its focus on providing quality telebehavioral care.

The Differentiator:

Array Behavioral Care one of the early providers of telemental health and telepsychiatry has been in the business for over 20 years. In fact, according to the company, their first telepsychiatry encounter dates back to 1999 with a rural hospital. Array’s goal is to collaborate with healthcare systems, hospitals, community-based medical care organizations, and insurers. As such, they are able to offer their services across a range of different settings to help reach people in a variety of care settings including hospitals, community health centers, nursing facilities, and substance-use medical centers, among others.

The company’s focus it to provide high-standard behavioral health services through increased services, access, and better patient results all through the range of partnerships. Array also provides administrative, operational, and technical support while attempting to take away that burden from doctors so they can focus on patient care and provide telepsychiatry services across all 50 states.

The Big Picture:

With the rise in social isolation, ongoing changes in societies and economics due to the Pandemic as well as the ongoing threat of endemic COVID itself, mental health conditions such as anxiety, depression, and substance abuse have come into even more focus. Due to these pressures, mental illness has surged in America since COVID began. With the increased mental health crisis there is an increased recognition of the need for mental health resources, psychological help, and additional therapeutic treatment options.

According to the Pew Research Center, 41% of adults have reported feeling increased levels of mental health anguish and despair since the outbreak of COVID. In addition, 58% of young adults have also experienced feeling mental health despair and distress in the period from March 2020 to September 2022. In addition, 22% of adults reported not feeling optimistic about the future at all or only on rare occasions.

Given the breadth of services, from counseling to telepsychiatry as well as the broad population that they serve (available in all 50 states) Array seeks to be the care option for those individuals who are suffering from mental illness. By partnering with organizations such as CVS and Humana, Array hopes to expand access to its network of over 40,000 doctors, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, and more. Through such partnerships, Array states that it has the ability to provide access to 90 M people across its network. Given the increased incidence in mental illness and the chronic shortage of providers, solutions like Array are required to close this gap.

Array Behavioral Care announces $25M funding round led by CVS Health; Array Behavioral Care raises $25M to expand its telepsychiatry business