Ksana Health to build mental health LLM in fed-funded project
Ksana Health to build mental health LLM in fed-funded project
Publish Date: 2026-05-22 11:10:00
Source Domain: www.fiercehealthcare.com
- Ksana Health, based in Eugene, Oregon, received a $17.9 million contract from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to create an advanced artificial intelligence model for behavioral health interventions.
- The project aims to train AI models using data from smartphones, wearables, and large-scale electronic health records (EHRs) to improve mental health and substance use disorder treatment.
- The initiative aims to transition behavioral healthcare from episodic and subjective assessments to continuous, data-driven health promotion.
- Ksana’s project, part of the HHS Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health’s (ARPA-H) EVIDENT program, involves multiple institutions, including Duke University, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and the Yale Stress Center.
- The project includes multi-phase phases, starting with a proof-of-concept study, followed by pilot data collection with tens of thousands of participants across various health systems.
- Participating health systems include Providence, MedStar Health, and the University of Washington.
- Recruitment for the study will start at Providence this summer, allowing individuals aged 18 and older to participate by downloading Ksana’s app and consenting to include their EHR information.
- The study aims to leverage sensing capabilities of everyday devices to create a new personalized and proactive model of behavioral healthcare.
