Therapy is at an inflection point.
One in five U.S. adults lives with a mental‑health condition each year. And by 2030, the country is on course to be short more than 12,500 adult psychiatrists and 11,500 addiction counselors. The need for mental health services has never been clearer, but the country simply doesn’t have enough clinicians. To meet the need, mental health services are turning to artificial intelligence. The goal isn’t to replace therapists, but to help them expand their reach and decrease their stress.
One such company, Florida‑based ReachLink, believes therapy works best with human-centered software. Tech can shoulder the drudgery, and humans can handle the treatment. The company embeds proprietary large‑language‑model (LLM) tools inside a nationwide network of almost 600 licensed clinicians. With that setup, the company now delivers close to 10,000 sessions a month.
AI as Copilot, Not Counselor
“Our thesis has been to build AI around the human, not replace the therapist,” says ReachLink’s founder and CEO, James Farese.
ReachLink’s machine‑learning layer drafts progress notes and triages journal entries. The software also automatically nudges patients who miss mood‑tracking check‑ins. Freed from data entry, clinicians can now devote the entire session to deeper clinical work. Farese says giving care providers that capability is lifting both engagement and outcomes.
A Rare Blend of Skills at Just the Right Time
What makes Farese the ideal founder for a digital therapy company? He brings a unique combination of technical, marketing, and healthcare operations expertise, and he’s applying all three to build a product at the intersection of code, compliance, and care delivery.
“In previous roles, I’ve had the chance to build technical products, scale digital brands, and manage complex healthcare operations,” he explains. “Bringing those threads together to solve a real problem in mental health is a rare opportunity — and one I’m deeply grateful to work on every day.”
Farese launched ReachLink in February 2019. Back then, the idea was to be a boutique after‑care platform for substance‑use treatment centers. Then COVID‑19 sent mental‑health demand into hyperdrive a year later in 2020. In that environment, the boot‑strapped venture broadened into full‑spectrum therapy and never looked back.
Today, the service is contracted with major payers such as Aetna and UnitedHealthcare. ReachLink also operates nationally.
“I remember a few years ago when we reached 1,000 sessions in a month, that was an exciting milestone,” Farese says.
Session volume has since increased nearly tenfold. And the internal team has swelled to nearly 60 employees. Proof, Farese notes, that you can grow fast in healthcare “without the need to raise institutional capital early on.”
Why Hybrid Care Matters
Pure chatbots promise instant solutions, but getting oversight right can be tricky. Traditional therapy, meanwhile, remains expensive and difficult to schedule. ReachLink’s hybrid model aims to offer the best of both. Here’s how:
- On-demand Digital Tools: AI‑powered journaling, check‑ins, and chat keep support on tap between live sessions.
- Empathy & safety: Licensed clinicians guide treatment, handle crises, and adjust care plans in real time.
- Efficiency: Automated notes and triage cut clinician admin time, allowing them to carry larger caseloads without burnout.
- Reimbursement: Because a licensed provider delivers every session, insurers cover appointments as standard telehealth visits.
ReachLink synchronizes digital mood logs, wearable data (soon), and therapist notes in one place. This integration allows caregivers to start each appointment with a richer context. Oftentimes, having more patient information is the difference between simply reacting to symptoms and preventing them.
Building the Mental Health Super App
The product roadmap stretches far beyond video therapy.
“My goal is to be the mental health super app, a one‑stop shop connecting therapy, AI tools, wearable data, and more,” Farese says. “I believe our integrative, collaborative experience seamlessly connects providers, members, and digital tools for best-in-class user experience.”
The company plans integrations with devices such as Apple Watches, which will feed metrics such as sleep and heart‑rate data into real‑time user dashboards. Consumers will also have the ability to choose à‑la‑carte care services, whether it’s stand‑alone journaling, AI chat, or full hybrid care, all inside a single platform.
A Competitive Advantage Built on Human Care at Scale
Any wellness app can add a large language model to the feature set. But few can deliver real, person-to-person care — at national scale — with a rapidly growing network of licensed clinicians and contracts with 66 active payors.
“It’s relatively easy to add a feature to an app,” Farese says. “It’s much harder to add 1,000 humans delivering care through that app.”
As AI levels the technical playing field, ReachLink’s operational depth and human-centered infrastructure could prove to be the more enduring differentiator.
The Bottom Line
Artificial intelligence is rewriting the workflows of mental‑health care. But humans still drive breakthroughs.
“I think the human connection is always going to matter,” Farese says.
By letting software handle the busywork, ReachLink hopes to make that connection cheaper, faster, and more effective. All at a scale the industry has never seen before.
To learn more about ReachLink’s hybrid human‑AI care model, visit their website.
