Problem
- Physical activity and youth sports have been shown to improve mental health in adolescents (i.e. age 13-18). [1, 2, 3]
- Over the past decade, youth sport participation and physical activity has declined in this population.
- Main factors driving this decline [4]: a. Higher costs b. Access to qualified mentors or coaches c. Increased competitive stress as youth enter high school. d. Fewer opportunities to continue casually for health or to be social. 1.2. Kremer et al. (2014). Physical activity, leisure-time screen use and depression among children and young adolescents. Brown et al. (2013). Physical activity interventions and depression in children and adolescents : a systematic review and meta-analysis. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23329611Jerstad et al. (2010). Prospective reciprocal relations between physical activity and depression in female adolescents.^
- 70% of kids quit youth sports by age 13 due to intense pressure of competition within sports and increased preference for extracurricular specialization for college admissions. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/parenting/wp/2016/06/01/why-70-percent-of-kids-quit-sports-by-age-13/
Existing Product
Strava
Existing Product/Service
Strava
● Physical activity tracking app
Existing Product/Service
Strava
● Physical activity tracking app
● Social media app
Gaps
● Geared toward adults.
○ No parental/shared accounts.
● No mentorship/coaching aspect for adolescents.
Solution
● Mentor/coach discovery
○ Virtual coaching: Lower cost.
○ Safety-screened, certified coaches.
○ Coaches with a similar background, e.g. mental health
issue
● Plans for adolescents looking for a casual
experience/environment
User Experience
- Kids/parents register for an activity, e.g. running, sprinting, swimming, biking, hiking
- Kids and coaches are matched and virtually meet up according to a regular schedule.
- Through sustained effort over several months, kids would achieve exercise quota goals
● 3 days a week for 50 minutes.
● Adolescent and coach identify goals each week.
○ e.g. mental well-being, life events
○ e.g. effort rather than quantity
● Coach would check-in before and after workouts
to hear about what happened and give
recommendations on how to get better next time
Example
- At-risk/depressed youth could have this service fully or nearly fully subsidized by their insurance plans, since this would fall under preventive services, pending a randomized controlled study. a. The ACA requires insurance to cover preventive services. Many plans offered through employer groups cover preventive services completely, or with low co-pays. More plans are now offer gym subsidies as well.
- For upper-middle to higher income households, a subscription service may be viable, e.g. $40 per month per user for the coaching.
Business Model
Impact
- Can run a randomized trial amongst at-risk/depressed youth
- Control group would be instructed by a physician to exercise more + take anti-depressant an and/or engage in weekly talk therapy, while treatment would use the Strava add on, in addition to anti-depressant/talk therapy.
- Success criteria would be the Hamilton Depression scale i.e “Do people who use our add-on have a significantly lower Hamilton depression scale rating than the control group?”
Further directions - stand on shoulders of giants!
- As the add-on app collects data on how certain workouts are more efficient at improving Hamilton depression score vs other workouts, it can recommend more targeted exercise treatments to users using ML algorithms.
- Recruit life coaches who have similar health backgrounds to paired students, e.g. a depressive marathon winner matched with depressed youth.
- Life coach can instruct a bit beyond just coaching - good dietary habits that work for them, good sleep habits, good social outreach habits, etc.
Our expertise is in the following areas:
Machine learning - predicting outcomes with health data Exercise - marathon runner, swimmer Design
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