Vanna Health: Reimagining Care and Community for Serious Mental Illness
Published: 2026 | Author: VisionariesNetwork Team
Founded in 2021 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Vanna Health is a pioneering healthcare company on a mission to transform how individuals with serious mental illness (SMI) engage with care systems and communities. Unlike most mental health startups that focus on broad wellness trends or digital therapy tools, Vanna targets one of the most vulnerable and underserved populations—people whose psychiatric conditions significantly impair daily functioning. These conditions, which include schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, often lead to reduced life expectancy, higher rates of homelessness, unemployment, incarceration, and social isolation.
A Mission That Challenges the Status Quo
At its core, Vanna Health is driven by the mission to empower people with serious mental illness to flourish by helping them find purpose and belonging in their communities. The company views the prevailing healthcare system as inadequate for this group: even though billions are spent annually on mental health care in the U.S., most people with SMI lack consistent access to psychosocial rehabilitation—a structured approach that integrates social support, life skills development, and meaningful community engagement alongside traditional clinical care.
Psychosocial rehabilitation is supported by decades of research showing it improves outcomes by focusing on social inclusion, employment, housing stability, and health management. Yet, up to 95% of adults with SMI still do not receive regular access to such support. Vanna seeks to close this gap by delivering these services at scale and through tailored, human-centered care models.
The Model: Community-Based, Person-Centered, and Inclusive
Vanna’s approach blends community-based support, clinical engagement, and technology to create a holistic care experience. Rather than simply offering telehealth visits or prescriptions, the company deploys personalized care teams that work directly with members to build trust, understand individual needs, and connect them with local resources. These teams are drawn from diverse backgrounds—including people with lived experience with mental illness—and operate in partnership with existing healthcare providers and community organizations.
This model rests on a few key principles:
Through this integrative strategy, the company aims not only to improve clinical outcomes—such as symptom reduction and reduced hospitalization—but also to enhance social outcomes like housing stability and meaningful engagement in community life. Metrics shared on their platform suggest that psychosocial rehabilitation delivered at scale can lead to measurable improvements in wellbeing and cost savings in care delivery.
Growth, Funding, and Impact
Since its launch, Vanna Health has attracted significant investor interest. The company quietly raised $29 million in early funding and has continued to secure capital to expand its operations and partnerships. More recently, additional financing rounds have extended its runway and capacity to pilot new programs.
Early partnerships with organizations like Blue Cross Blue Shield affiliates and other payers aim to demonstrate how a value-based care model focused on psychosocial support can reduce overall healthcare costs while driving better outcomes. The company positions its model as a potential alternative to traditional fee-for-service systems, especially in behavioral health where outcomes have historically lagged despite increased spending.
Technology and Workforce
While the heart of Vanna’s work is human connection, technology plays an enabling role. The company employs data platforms and digital tools to coordinate care, track outcomes, and support its community-based teams in delivering personalized interventions. Vanna’s growing tech infrastructure also underpins its research into effective practices and scalable models.
The company is actively hiring across roles—from community health workers to technology and data engineering positions—illustrating its dual emphasis on people and digital capability. These teams work together to build an infrastructure that supports complex care delivery for individuals with diverse needs.
Looking Forward: Transforming Behavioral Health Care
Vanna Health stands at the intersection of care, community, and innovation. Its focus on serious mental illness—an often overlooked segment of the population—sets it apart from many digital health companies. By combining compassionate support with evidence-based psychosocial rehabilitation and strategic partnerships, Vanna aims to create a scalable model that not only improves lives but also presents a viable economic approach to managing chronic behavioral health conditions.
As the company grows and tests its model more broadly, its work could influence how health systems and payers think about value-based care in mental health—moving beyond symptom management to truly supporting individuals in leading fulfilling lives.
Emilio’s Story and the Vision Behind Vanna Health
The origins of Vanna Health are deeply personal for its co-founder and CEO, Dr. Giovanni Colella. The company’s mission is rooted in the life and loss of his father, Emilio, who spent much of his life battling serious mental illness before dying by suicide.
Growing up with a parent living with serious mental illness left a lasting imprint on Colella’s worldview. As a child, he experienced persistent insecurity, fear, loneliness, and sadness—emotions shaped by the instability and challenges that mental illness can bring into a family. Those early experiences did not fade with time; instead, they became a quiet but powerful force influencing how he understood vulnerability, care, and human connection.
In adulthood, Colella’s path diverged from his father’s in critical ways. With the support of his wife, family, and access to therapy, he was able to heal, grow, and ultimately thrive. That contrast—between his own ability to build a fulfilling life and his father’s lifelong struggle—became a question that stayed with him: Why do some people with mental illness find stability and hope, while so many others do not?
Part of the answer, he realized, lies in access to timely, consistent, and comprehensive support. Treatment, when available and paired with meaningful human connection, can change the trajectory of a life. Too often, however, people with serious mental illness are left isolated—treated episodically rather than supported holistically, and disconnected from the communities that give life meaning.
That realization led to the creation of Vanna Health.
At Vanna Health, the company operates on a foundational belief: a sense of belonging and active engagement in the community is essential to improving overall health and wellbeing for individuals living with serious mental illness. Clinical care alone is not enough. Recovery and stability require purpose, relationships, and consistent social support—elements that have historically been missing from traditional mental health systems.
Vanna Health was built to address that gap. The company focuses on helping individuals with serious mental illness move beyond survival toward fuller participation in life, emphasizing community integration, personalized support, and long-term engagement. In doing so, it seeks to create outcomes that Emilio, and countless others like him, were never given a fair chance to achieve.
Emilio’s story is not simply a memory—it is the moral compass guiding Vanna Health’s work. Through its model of care, the company aims to ensure that fewer families endure the same loss, and that more individuals living with serious mental illness are given the support, dignity, and opportunity to build lives of meaning.
“We believe that a sense of belonging and engagement in the community is the foundation for improving overall health and wellbeing for individuals with serious mental illness.”
