Venja Health Recognizing and addressing loneliness as a prevalent healthcare need.

I founded Venja Health with a goal to use health technology to help millions of people. Motivated by family members with various healthcare challenges, I recognized two emerging epidemics with unmet needs: chronic diseases and loneliness My loved ones have chronic conditions including diabetes, kidney disease and cardiac disease. These were exacerbated by the pandemic and inspired me to consider closely the interplay between loneliness and mental health in people with chronic diseases.

Diseases classed as Chronic by the CDC, such as diabetes or hypertension, are, unfortunately, very prevalent and becoming more common.

A 2020 study issued by the CDC examined only 10 chronic conditions: arthritis, asthma, cancer, coronary heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), diabetes, hepatitis, hypertension, kidney disease and stroke.

These 10 conditions are responsible for ~450 million diagnoses in the US. On average this is more than one per American (including children). This is only considering those 10 conditions studied; there are thousands of other diagnoses that were not studied in detail and so it is likely that the average number of chronic diseases is much larger.

We tend to think of chronic diseases as a problem of the elderly, but they occur in younger adults and at alarming rates. In fact, about 16% of younger adults, ages 18-44 have 2 or more chronic conditions.[1] This equates to about 20 million American younger adults that are expected to have chronic diseases for their entire life.

Loneliness, on the other hand, is a relatively underrecognized epidemic, which has only worsened with the pandemic. In 2018, a Kaiser Family Foundation study reported that ~60 million Americans felt lonely.[2] During the pandemic, according to a Harvard study, this number has increased to 36%. In their study, 36% of respondents reported feeling lonely “frequently” or “almost all the time or all the time” .[3] This equates to almost 100 million Americans. This does not even take into consideration the global impact of loneliness.

Loneliness not only has psychological effects, but it also leads to negative physical effects. It has been reported that loneliness has a similar negative impact as smoking 15 cigarettes per day.[4]

Some effects on the body include:[5, 6]

Worsening hypertension (increase in blood pressure)

Increased flight or flight response (increased norepinephrine), which can disrupt sleep and increase risk of long-term inflammation

Increased stress hormones (increase in cortisol)

Increase risk of stroke

Increased risk of heart disease

Higher mortality rate

Loneliness and chronic disease lead to a vicious cycle. As noted above, loneliness can have a negative health impact. In turn, chronic diseases such as diabetes lead to social isolation and loneliness.

There are also genetic factors that contribute to the development of loneliness and chronic diseases in people. Certain genetic mutations have been associated with loneliness and the interplay between the genetic predisposition for loneliness and the development of chronic diseases such as coronary heart disease. [7, 8] To combat chronic diseases and loneliness Venja Health is building a health tracker mobile app with genetics / personalized medicine platform. The app helps people track their health, symptoms, mood and voice biomarkers and it connects them anonymously to others for accountability and support.

The genetic information allows for personalized insights into people ' s health and behavior. Taken all together, Venja Health is working towards helping people build happier, healthier lives. We will present our technology at Innovation Theater at AHIS2022. To receive updates on our journey, you can subscribe to email list at https://www.venjahealth.com

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9. Boersma P, Black LI, Ward BW. Prevalence of Multiple Chronic Conditions Among US Adults, 2018. Prev Chronic Dis 2020;17:200130. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5888/pcd17.200130external icon. https://www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2020/20 _ 0130.htm#:~:text=In%202018%2C%205 1.8%25%20of%20US,those%20living%20in%20rural%20areas. Kaiser Family Foundation, 2018. https://www.kff.org/report-section/lonelinessand-social-isolation-in-the-united-states-the-united-kingdom-and-japanan-international-survey-introduction/ Harvard, 2020. https://mcc.gse.harvard.edu/reports/loneliness-in-america Kidambi, N., & Lee, E. E. (2020). Insight into Potential Mechanisms Linking Loneliness and Cognitive Decline: Commentary on "Health Factors as Potential Mediator the Longitudinal Effect of Loneliness on General Cognitive Ability " . The American journal of geriatric psychiatry : official journal of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry, 28(12), 1284–1286. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jagp.2020.08.015 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7452903/#:~:text=Loneliness%20 impacts%20mental%20and%20physical,decline%2C%20and%20shrinking%20soci al%20networks. CDC. https://www.cdc.gov/aging/publications/features/lonely-olderadults.html Cleveland Clinic. https://health.clevelandclinic.org/what-happens-in-yourbody-when-youre-lonely/ Abdellaoui A, Sanchez-Roige S, Sealock J, Treur JL, Dennis J, Fontanillas P, Elson S; 23andme Research Team, Nivard MG, Ip HF, van der Zee M, Baselmans BML, Hottenga JJ, Willemsen G, Mosing M, Lu Y, Pedersen NL, Denys D, Amin N, M van Duijn C, Szilagyi I, Tiemeier H, Neumann A, Verweij KJH, Cacioppo S, Cacioppo JT, Davis LK, Palmer AA, Boomsma DI. Phenome-wide investigation of health outcomes associated with genetic predisposition to loneliness. Hum Mol Genet. 2019 Nov 15;28(22):3853-3865. doi: 10.1093/hmg/ddz219. PMID: 31518406; PMCID: PMC6935385. Dennis J, Sealock J, Levinson RT, Farber-Eger E, Franco J, Fong S, Straub P, Hucks D, Song WL, Linton MF, Fontanillas P, Elson SL, Ruderfer D, Abdellaoui A, SanchezRoige S, Palmer AA, Boomsma DI, Cox NJ, Chen G, Mosley JD, Wells QS, Davis LK. Genetic risk for major depressive disorder and loneliness in sex-specific associations with coronary artery disease. Mol Psychiatry. 2021 Aug;26(8):42544264. doi: 10.1038/s41380-019-0614-y. Epub 2019 Dec 3. PMID: 31796895; PMCID: PMC7266730.

In a world that's vastly changing and evolving, we do our best to keep up with the demands of the world. In hopes that what we work hard for the return of investment is greater. Often times we marginalize and overlook the truths of our past as if it doesn't exist, when in doubt our foundation, and past trauma plays a major role in how we maneuver throughout our daily lives and contributes to our relationships and success. Mental health has always been a topic that nobody really cares to broadcast for various reasons until something becomes tragic and it's over the news. Jessica Reliford presents her new book,

Jessica Reliford

A Daughter's Cry From Unveiled Secrets to Fulfillment, where she uses writing as a therapeutic instrument to explain her story of events and as a way of healing, inspiring, and encouraging others to change the narrative of their story. Mental health is far more important than what society bares to address. It's time to be pioneers for our youth that are not only watching us but also be examples of how 'WE" chose to tackle obstacles that were meant to destroy us and provide the tools needed for them to succeed.