StartUp Health NOW Podcast

The podcast discusses the issue of wasteful spending in healthcare and introduces two founders using AI to tackle the problem. They delve into the alarming amount of wasteful spending in healthcare, highlight examples of redundant care and unethical billing practices. The conversation focuses on how AI algorithms can identify and reduce wasteful spending, the role of audits and automating record review with AI.

Entrepreneurs and researchers are working to tackle Alzheimer's disease by using artificial intelligence to predict it earlier. They are also building digital platforms to empower community health workers and enhance senior care in communities.

This podcast explores the role of food as medicine in managing chronic diseases. It introduces two platforms, Yumlish and Edamam, which leverage nutritional information to improve health. They discuss the lack of nutrition guidance from doctors and the challenge of too much information online. The guests also highlight the need for tech-enabled solutions to address the shortage of dietitians. They emphasize the importance of clinical outcomes, engagement, trust, and culturally competent programs. Overall, the podcast showcases the next wave of tech-enabled nutrition.

According to some estimates, out of the HHS, nearly 50% of kids have experienced some kind of mental health challenge. And not just anxiety about an upcoming test or depression over a breakup, but persistent feelings that interfere with daily activities. Health innovation companies have been on the case for years, including many from the StartUp Health community. They're tackling the science – like what's the best way to treat mental health challenges in teens – and they're also tackling engagement. You can have the best tools in the world after all, but if a young person doesn't want to get help, it'll never go anywhere. Enter Katherine Grill, PhD, CEO & Co-founder of Neolth, one of our guests on this podcast episode. She's taken her doctorate in behavioral neuroscience and her experience as a clinician, combined with hundreds of interviews with young people, in order to build a platform that meets kids where they're at – offering self-guided mental health support in a variety of forms and flavors. Joining the podcast with us is former pro basketball player, Kenny Thomas. After spending 11 seasons in the NBA, Thomas became an entrepreneur and community advocate, with a focus on youth experiencing financial hardship via his own foundation. And now he's throwing his influence behind Neolth in order to help young people, particularly those involved in sports, gain access to mental health services. On this StartUp Health NOW episode, we’ll cover the ins and outs of the Neolth platform as well as some of Dr. Grill’s strategy behind working with a brand ambassador, which is somewhat unique in the world of early-stage health startups. Let's get into it. Innovators: Health Transformer University fuels your health moonshot Funders: Become a Health Moonshot Champion Want more content like this? You can subscribe to the podcast as well as other health innovation updates at startuphealth.com/content. Sign up for StartUp Health Insider™ to get funding insights, news, and special updates delivered to your inbox. Looking to break down health barriers? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our Health Equity Moonshot. Passionate about Type 1 diabetes? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our T1D Moonshot.

Featured founders on the podcast are using AI and big data to re-humanize healthcare. Nicole Cook, CEO & Founder of Alvee, aims to improve health equity and outcomes by bringing relevant information to the surface. Chris Turner, CEO & Co-founder at HealthBook+, discusses leveraging data and AI to identify health trends.

This week’s StartUp Health NOW podcast episode is a conversation with Health Transformers Alexandra Dantzig and Erin Frankel, the co-founders of Jetsweat. As you'll hear, their company started out as a fittech marketplace for boutique fitness brands, helping these small independent fitness companies create high-quality digital content and reach new audiences. Recently, however, Jetsweat – which joined StartUp Health in 2022 – has made moves into the realm of value-based, whole person care. They've launched what they call Jetsweat Health and they have their sights set on helping large employers and insurers keep their people healthy. The idea is instead of offering your employees or members a simple discount to a couple of national fitness chains, offer them access to a marketplace of hundreds or even thousands of unique high-quality boutique fitness brands that meet their specific needs and desires. Jetsweat is also stepping into mental health with new offerings around emotional fitness. They're making very clear connections between preventative physical fitness and preventative emotional fitness by treating mental health more like a daily workout that everyone can benefit from. They're lowering the barriers to care and decreasing the stigma attached with seeking help. Listen in for their journey. Innovators: Health Transformer University fuels your health moonshot Funders: Become a Health Moonshot Champion Want more content like this? You can subscribe to the podcast as well as other health innovation updates at startuphealth.com/content. Sign up for StartUp Health Insider™ to get funding insights, news, and special updates delivered to your inbox. Looking to break down health barriers? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our Health Equity Moonshot. Passionate about Type 1 diabetes? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our T1D Moonshot.

There's a phrase that gets thrown around a lot in business: “You can't manage what you can't measure.” It's a quote attributed to Peter Drucker, the famed management consultant.‌ If business leaders such as Peter Drucker are right, not being able to measure the effect of an action would make it impossible to know if we should be doing more or less of that action – or if we should be doing it at all. But if the saying is true in management, it's even more true in clinical medicine in most areas of healthcare. Despite this seeming to be self evident, you’ve got to measure it to manage it yet there are still swathes of care that are delivered by some version of trial and error.‌ Our guest this week is Bechara Saab, PhD, CEO, Chief Scientist & Co-founder of Mobio Interactive, a company that joined the StartUp Health community in 2022.‌ Dr. Saab started as an academic researcher. It's safe to say he loves measuring, loves gathering hard data and proving that he has found causation not just correlation in his work. So when his research introduced him to the modern world of mental health diagnosis and mental healthcare, he was taken aback by what he saw as a lack of solid objective measurements.‌ How could you help someone with anxiety, for instance, if you couldn't accurately measure their anxiety before and after a treatment?‌ That is the thorny challenge that Dr. Saab is tackling with Mobio Interactive. As you’ll hear, he’ll explain just how his research led to a solution that provides those objective measurements. His company, based in Singapore, came up with an accessible tool that provides clinically-validated therapy within a platform that objectively quantifies how a patient’s mental health is affected by therapy in real time and without a wearable, thereby allowing personalization of mental health therapy at scale. Enjoy! Innovators: Health Transformer University fuels your health moonshot Funders: Become a Health Moonshot Champion Want more content like this? You can subscribe to the podcast as well as other health innovation updates at startuphealth.com/content. Sign up for StartUp Health Insider™ to get funding insights, news, and special updates delivered to your inbox. Looking to break down health barriers? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our Health Equity Moonshot. Passionate about Type 1 diabetes? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our T1D Moonshot.

Our StartUp Health NOW guest this week is Amir Bozorgzadeh, CEO & Co-founder of Virtuleap, a brain health company that joined StartUp Health in 2019. Headquartered in Lisbon, Portugal, and expanding to Barcelona, Spain, Virtuleap improves brain health with VR. In this chat, Amir will walk us through their new platform – Cogniclear VR – that combines neuroscience with virtual reality games and activities to detect cognitive disorders. He’ll explain how VR can play an important role in the diagnosis of Alzheimer's and other dementias, why VR needs to be applied with care in health, and where virtual reality is going next. Enjoy! Innovators: Health Transformer University fuels your health moonshot Funders: Become a Health Moonshot Champion Want more content like this? You can subscribe to the podcast as well as other health innovation updates at startuphealth.com/content. Sign up for StartUp Health Insider™ to get funding insights, news, and special updates delivered to your inbox. Looking to break down health barriers? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our Health Equity Moonshot. Passionate about Type 1 diabetes? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our T1D Moonshot.

Our StartUp Health NOW guest this week is Ole Kjerkegaard Nielsen, PhD, CEO & Co-founder of GO-Pen, a company in our Type 1 Diabetes Moonshot community. As you'll hear, Nielsen and his team based in Denmark have built a new kind of insulin pen, one that is affordable and accessible to all while also adhering to the absolute highest standards of quality. This more accessible insulin pen could change millions of people's lives. We'll also get a glimpse into the uniquely challenging startup journey of developing a physical medical device. Nielsen and his team have been winning awards and grants on a regular basis, but the road is still steep. Whether it's negotiating with a manufacturer across the globe or getting FDA approval, bringing a medical device to market as a startup with limited funds is a challenge that could intimidate even the most market-tested CEOs. Nielsen pulls back the curtain and lets us see that challenge from the inside and shows us where GO-Pen is going next. Enjoy! Innovators: Health Transformer University fuels your health moonshot Funders: Become a Health Moonshot Champion Want more content like this? You can subscribe to the podcast as well as other health innovation updates at startuphealth.com/content. Sign up for StartUp Health Insider™ to get funding insights, news, and special updates delivered to your inbox. Looking to break down health barriers? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our Health Equity Moonshot. Passionate about Type 1 diabetes? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our T1D Moonshot.

We’re back with a new season of the StartUp Health NOW podcast! This week we’re chatting with Richard Hirsch from UnaliWear. UnaliWear, under the guidance of CEO & Founder Jean Anne Booth, is a long-time StartUp Health community member that is changing the game in medical alerts for seniors. UnaliWear built the voice-first Kanega watch that provides discreet support for falls, medication reminders, and a guard against wandering – and allows seniors to call for help if they need it. It gives seniors independence without making them wear a stigmatizing alert button around their necks. And, now, after years of other awards and accolades, the Kanega watch was just named by The New York Times Wirecutter as the best medical alert device for people on the go. That's the kind of market validation that startups dream about. Listen in as Hirsch shares insights on how UnaliWear grew into a "10-year overnight success." ------ Founders: Health Transformer University fuels your health moonshot Funders: Become a Health Moonshot Champion Want more content like this? You can subscribe to the podcast as well as other health innovation updates at startuphealth.com/content. Sign up for StartUp Health Insider™ to get funding insights, news, and special updates delivered to your inbox. Looking to break down health barriers? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our Health Equity Moonshot. Passionate about Type 1 diabetes? If you’re an entrepreneur or investor, contact us to learn how you can join our T1D Moonshot.