A digital treatment transforming anxiety care

More than 1,600 patients in South Yorkshire used the app Daylight to manage their anxiety over 12 months, with 81 per cent reporting a reduction in anxiety and tension. 

Our team at the South Yorkshire Innovation Hub co-ordinated a collaboration of partners to enable real-world evaluation, helping to recruit GPs and patients to take part in the pilot.  

Daylight is a digital, first-line therapeutic app for anxiety, developed by Big Health. It delivers personalised cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) to help individuals manage symptoms of anxiety and worry. 

The app aims to reduce reliance on medication, reduce additional GP appointments, and improve mental health-related patient outcomes. 

Offered free to patients in South Yorkshire as part of a 15-month economic evaluation delivered by the York Health Economics Consortium, the app was assessed for its effectiveness as a first-line treatment for Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD) and its impact on healthcare services. 

The initial target was 1000 patients and this was surpassed five months ahead of schedule, highlighting strong demand for accessible digital mental health support.  

The Daylight solution aligns with the severe mental illness clinical area of focus in NHS England’s Core20PLUS5 approach; and the sickness to prevention and analogue to digital shifts in the Government’s Ten-Year Health Plan. 

Around 40 per cent of adults suffer from moderate to high levels of anxiety, and up to 20 per cent of adults who visit their GPs for non-mental health issues have episodes of anxiety disorder. 

Our support 

Delivered in conjunction with the South Yorkshire Innovation Hub, Big Health, Primary Care Sheffield and South Yorkshire Integrated Care Board, patients across 137 practices in Barnsley, Doncaster, Sheffield and Rotherham were referred to Daylight.  

The South Yorkshire Innovation Hub played a key role in bringing together stakeholders to work collaboratively in adopting and accelerating the use of Daylight, recruiting both patients and practices to enable real-world evaluation. Benefits of fostering this strong partnership included: 

• Earlier access to treatment, leading to better-managed GAD symptoms  
• Increased confidence in adopting innovation across primary care  
• A scalable model for linking datasets to evaluate interventions  
• Reduced GP appointments and administrative burden including fit notes
• Potential reduction in escalation to severe mental illness and secondary care 

 Economic impact: 

Early findings from Big Health’s analysis showed that Daylight, compared to controls, has saved around five GP appointments per person and replaced one fit note. With more than 1,600 patients receiving treatment via Daylight in the South Yorkshire region, this equates to saving around 7,500 GP appointments and returning 7,500 working days to the local economy 

Patient impact:  

• 81 per cent of patients reported reduced tension after a single Daylight technique 
• 67 per cent used Daylight’s techniques in everyday life, away from the app – key evidence of sustained behavioural change 

Patient feedback has been positive: 

“It helped me control my anxiety and think about what I could and could not control. Although I still worry as that is the sort of person I am, my anxiety is under control.”
Daylight user, 50s, South Yorkshire, June 2025 

“Before, I wouldn’t really leave the house on my own. Now I go on walks, run errands, even travel to another city. Daylight helped me just experience things on my own.”
Daylight user, 20s, South Yorkshire, June 2025 

“This app has been really easy to use and has helped me a lot. It has taught me many ways to manage my anxiety and I now use these methods in my everyday life.”
Daylight user, 20s, South Yorkshire, June 2025 

Big Health agreed to extend provision of Daylight beyond the initial target of 1,000 patients, to ensure new patients continue to have access to a much-needed treatment, building on the success of embedding Daylight into local care pathways. 

Ian Wood, UK Medical Director at Big Health said:

“Reaching our patient access target five months early is testament to the strength of this collaboration with our NHS partners. It also highlights the scale of the opportunity for digital treatments to help meet rising levels of unmet need in mental health care. 

“I’m delighted that Daylight is helping patients in South Yorkshire manage their anxiety in a way that’s immediate, safe, and effective.”

Dr David Crichton, Chief Medical Officer at South Yorkshire ICB said:

“This milestone shows how digital therapeutics like Daylight can be a game-changer, empowering patients and supporting NHS services at the same time. This early achievement reflects the potential of digital tools to transform mental health care by offering scalable, evidence-based interventions that work well alongside our front-line services”