Episode 382: Revolutionizing Recovery: Using Data to Speed Up Healing With Nawal Roy

In this episode, Duane Osterlind talks with Nawal Roy, the visionary behind Holmusk, the world’s largest clinical data platform for mental health. After a successful career in finance, Nawal pivoted to healthcare, driven by the realization that mental health is one of the most complex, yet least quantified, areas of medicine.

They dive deep into how Holmusk has spent 11 years building a "scientific-grade" database of over 42 million patients, shifting mental health care away from "hunches and poetry" toward precision and evidence-based science.

Key Discussion Points

• The Data Gap in Mental Health: Historically, mental health treatment has relied on clinician intuition rather than hard data. Nawal explains how Holmusk "normalizes" messy, unstructured electronic health records to create a searchable, scientific database.
• The 10-Year Wait: Data reveals a heartbreaking reality: the average journey from the onset of symptoms to receiving meaningful care is 8 to 10 years.
• Ending the Trial-and-Error Cycle: A typical acute patient might cycle through 10 to 12 different medications over 18 months before finding what works. Nawal discusses how large-scale data can help clinicians find the right treatment faster.
• The Power of Comorbidity: Mental health doesn't exist in a vacuum. Treating depression can significantly improve outcomes for physical conditions like diabetes, yet these are often treated as separate issues.
• Measurement-Based Care: Nawal argues that "engagement is not outcome." He highlights the desperate need to move toward a system that measures functional improvement (like GAF or CGI scores) rather than just "showing up for therapy."
• AI and the Future of Psychiatry: How Holmusk is using Natural Language Processing (NLP) to "read" thousands of unstructured doctor's notes and train AI models to provide clinically accurate—not just "nice sounding"—guidance.

"Mental health is currently closer to poetry than science... we need to bring the level of rigor found in pediatric oncology to the mental health community." — Nawal Roy

"You can't improve what you don't measure. If we have data, we can actually make real, significant change to people's lives." — Duane Osterlind

Big Takeaways

1. Demand Data: Patients and stakeholders should demand that mental health be treated with the same clinical rigor as physical health.
2. Outcome over Engagement: Simply attending sessions isn't enough; we must measure whether the patient is actually getting better.
3. The Role of AI: AI has the potential to democratize access to care, but it must be trained on massive, clinically valid datasets to avoid "hallucinations" and provide safe, effective support.

Resources Mentioned

• Holmusk: holmusk.com
• NeuroBlue: Holmusk’s flagship data analytics platform.
• ACE Study: Referenced by Duane regarding Adverse Childhood Experiences and their long-term health impacts.

• LinkedIn: Nawal Roy

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Supporting Resources:

If you live in California and are looking for counseling or therapy please check out Novus Mindful Life Counseling and Recovery Center

NovusMindfulLife.com

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