Psychopharm Secrets: Coming Off Meds

In this episode of The Carlat Psychiatry Podcast, Dr. Chris Aiken and Kellie Newsome explore the “placebo flip”—a phenomenon where patients feel temporarily better after stopping psychiatric medications, only to relapse months later. They discuss the psychological boost of stopping treatment and the delayed nature of symptom return, which can obscure clinical insight. The episode also highlights the growing role of AI in psychiatry, including tools like TDScreen that enhance detection of tardive dyskinesia. These insights point to the importance of blending innovation with clinical vigilance in behavioral health. Listen to the full episode here.

Videra Health Launches TDScreen, a First-of-Its-Kind Video-based, AI-powered Tool to Assess Tardive Dyskinesia Symptoms

Videra Health Logo

New study published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry reveals AI enables efficient, accurate and scalable detection of TD, representing a significant advancement in meeting the standard of care for TD screening

Orem, UT, June 3, 2025 – Videra Health, a leading AI platform for behavioral health providers, has announced the launch of TDScreen, the first-ever automated, video-based AI solution on the market to screen for Tardive Dyskinesia (TD) symptoms. TD is a chronic, involuntary movement disorder that can develop as a side effect of long-term use of certain medications, particularly antipsychotic drugs. While TDScreen isn’t intended as a standalone diagnostic tool, it represents a significant advancement in meeting the standard of care for TD screening.

TD presents unique screening challenges even for experienced clinicians and remains underdiagnosed. TD affects up to 2.6 million Americans, and up to 7 million Americans taking antipsychotic medications could develop TD symptoms. With its involuntary movements often mistaken for nervousness, aging, or other conditions, the gap in recognition represents not just a clinical challenge, but a deeply human one that affects quality of life and treatment outcomes. A paper published Wednesday in The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, led by Principal Investigator Dr. Anthony Sterns and members of the iRxReminder and Videra Health teams, reveals that video-based AI enables efficient, accurate, and scalable detection of TD. This application has the potential to significantly improve early diagnosis and patient outcomes, especially in remote care settings where resources are scarcest. Videra Health’s TDScreen algorithm was built using the data from multiple studies, which was supported in part by the National Institute of Mental Health, and represents a significant leap forward in integrating artificial intelligence into psychiatric care, particularly in the era of telemedicine.

“Videra Health is thrilled to be able to launch a first-of-its-kind innovative solution to screen for TD symptoms, effectively,” said Loren Larsen, CEO of Videra Health. “TDScreen and our broader AI platform aren’t about replacing clinician judgment—they’re about enhancing it. By automating routine screenings, we free healthcare providers to focus on what matters most: the human connections and complex decision-making that drive quality care.” Larsen added, “We are grateful for the multiple academic and research partners who have contributed their time and expertise to these studies.”

“Early detection of TD is critical to mitigating its debilitating effects,” said Dr. Anthony A. Sterns, Ph.D., lead researcher on the project and CEO at iRxReminder. “Our AI-driven approach not only matches but exceeds human expert performance, offering a scalable solution to a major unmet clinical need,” added Dr. Joel W. Hughes, Ph.D., collaborator from Kent State University.

“As a physician who both treats –and lives with– tardive dyskinesia, this research marks a turning point for millions of patients who have been forced to wonder if the movement disorder they suffer from could be treatable,” says Owen S, Muir, M.D., CMO of iRxReminder, CMO and co-founder of Radial Health, and co-author of the publication.  “Now, physicians have a simple, evidence-based AI-guided tool to support their clinical decision making.”

TDScreen was validated across three clinical studies involving more than 350 participants on antipsychotic medications. The innovative AI tool developed by Videra Health utilizes advanced video analysis and a vision transformer machine learning architecture to detect TD with unprecedented accuracy. TDScreen demonstrates a Cohen’s Kappa of 0.61—a number indicating the algorithm is outperforming even calibrated human raters. The algorithm achieved an area under the receiver-operating-characteristic curve (AUC) of 0.89, surpassing the sensitivity and specificity of trained human raters using the standard Abnormal Involuntary Movement Scale (AIMS).

These numbers represent more than just statistical achievements—they translate to real-world benefits:

  • Consistency: Unlike human raters whose assessments may vary, AI provides the same evaluation standards every time
  • Accessibility: Patients can complete assessments from home on their own devices
  • Efficiency: Providers save valuable clinical time while increasing screening frequency
  • Earlier detection: Subtle symptoms can be identified before they become pronounced

Continuous monitoring: Regular assessments track symptom progression or improvement

With TDScreen, patients on antipsychotics can easily complete video-based screenings in-office or remotely, and enable providers to monitor or modify their treatment plans. The TDScreen tool is based on the Abnormal Involuntary Movement Scale (AIMS), a comprehensive clinician-rated scale designed to specifically evaluate involuntary movements. Employing advanced AI video technology, TDScreen efficiently assesses and quantifies the risk of TD in less than 5 minutes. The resulting score generated by this assessment can aid in clinical decision-making and management strategies.

TDscreen is available free of charge for any provider or patient wanting to screen for TD. Visit tdscreen.ai to learn more.

About Videra Health™

Videra Health is a leading AI platform for behavioral health providers and proactively identifies, triages and monitors at-risk patients using linguistic, audio and video analysis. The FDA-registered digital platform transforms how doctors and healthcare systems interact and track a patient’s journey, illuminating the hidden depths of patient behavior and outcomes. Videra Health connects providers and patients anytime, anywhere, between visits and post-discharge via written and video assessments that translate into actionable quantitative and qualitative patient data. The platform streamlines diagnoses, enhances care accessibility, optimizes workflows and drives down costs for providers and healthcare systems. 

For more information, visit www.viderahealth.com.

About iRxReminder
iRxReminder specializes in digital health solutions aimed at enhancing medication adherence and mental health management through cutting-edge technology applications and innovative behavioral science solutions.

For more information, visit www.irxreminder.com.

How AI-Driven Innovation is Transforming Tardive Dyskinesia Detection and Patient Care

man shaking hand holding glass of water

As we recognize Tardive Dyskinesia (TD) Awareness Week, I’m reflecting on the significant challenges faced by both patients living with TD and the healthcare providers dedicated to their care. TD remains underdiagnosed despite affecting millions of Americans taking antipsychotic medications, with its involuntary movements often mistaken for nervousness, aging, or other conditions. This gap in recognition represents not just a clinical challenge, but a deeply human one that affects quality of life and treatment outcomes.

The Challenge of TD Detection

Tardive Dyskinesia presents unique screening challenges even for experienced clinicians. Traditional AIMS (Abnormal Involuntary Movement Scale) assessments, while valuable, face several real-world limitations:

  • Assessments are often rushed in busy clinical settings
  • Training and experience among raters is inconsistent
  • Unconscious biases can affect evaluations (such as assumptions about which populations are affected)
  • Ongoing monitoring is inconsistent due to limited capacity

Our research and work with clinics show that when different people check the same patients for TD symptoms, they often don’t agree on what they see. Even trained clinicians who haven’t been calibrated together achieve a Cohen’s Kappa score of only 0.37 (±0.05), suggesting significant inconsistency. Even after calibration, this improves to just 0.57 (±0.03). In other words, humans are inconsistent even when rating the same patient and symptoms.

This variability in assessment doesn’t just represent a data problem—it directly impacts patient care, potentially delaying crucial interventions that could improve quality of life.

How AI-Powered TD Screening Improves Detection Accuracy

At Videra Health, we’ve developed TDScreen, an AI-powered solution designed to address these challenges head-on. TDScreen uses advanced video analysis technology to evaluate patients for potential TD symptoms quickly and efficiently. Patients can take the screener on their own time, on their own device. The results have been remarkable, with our AI model demonstrating a Cohen’s Kappa of 0.61—outperforming even calibrated human raters.

TDScreen’s performance metrics show its power as a clinical support tool:

  • AUC (Area Under Curve): 0.85 (0.83 – 0.97)
  • Sensitivity/Specificity = 0.79 (0.70 – 0.93)/0.82 (0.73 – 0.92)
  • Precision/Recall = 0.81 (0.73 – 0.92)/0.79 (0.70 – 0.93)

These numbers represent more than just statistical achievements—they translate to real-world benefits:

  • Consistency: Unlike human raters whose assessments may vary, AI provides the same evaluation standards every time
  • Accessibility: Patients can complete assessments from home on their own devices
  • Efficiency: Providers save valuable clinical time while increasing screening frequency
  • Earlier detection: Subtle symptoms can be identified before they become pronounced
  • Continuous monitoring: Regular assessments track symptom progression or improvement

Moving Beyond Detection to Comprehensive Care

While TDScreen isn’t intended as a standalone diagnostic tool, it represents a significant advancement in meeting the standard of care for TD screening. The American Psychiatric Association guidelines recommend regular monitoring for TD in patients taking antipsychotics, but time constraints often make this challenging to implement consistently.

Our AI-assisted approach helps bridge this gap by making regular screening more feasible, ultimately leading to earlier intervention when symptoms are detected. This approach aligns perfectly with measurement-based care principles, providing objective data to inform treatment decisions.

The Human Element of Technology

It’s important to emphasize that TDScreen and our broader AI platform aren’t about replacing clinician judgment—they’re about enhancing it. By automating routine screenings, we free healthcare providers to focus on what matters most: the human connections and complex decision-making that drive quality care.

One provider using TDScreen shared, “I love it, I had a patient that took the screener, and it picked up on movements I would have missed. It works great!”

This Tardive Dyskinesia Awareness Week, I invite healthcare providers to consider how AI-powered tools like TDScreen can help them meet and exceed the standard of care for TD screening and monitoring. By embracing these innovations, we can collectively improve outcomes for the millions of patients at risk for or living with tardive dyskinesia.

At Videra Health, we’re committed to continuing this important work, combining advanced technology with compassionate care to transform how we understand, detect, and manage TD. Together, we can make significant progress in addressing this challenging condition and improving the lives of those affected by it.

To learn more about TDScreen and to sign up to use TDScreen at no cost in your practice, visit TDScreen.ai

Check our blog for the latest discussions on AI in healthcare, behavioral health, life sciences and clinical trials.