Entrepreneurs in Rock Health's 5th class
San Francisco-based digital health accelerator Rock Health put on its fifth demo day this week. Rock Health announced the class in June and the accelerator ran until this past week when companies made presentations to show how they have grown in the past three months. Of the 11 companies, 10 presented at the demo day.
This class had some high profile startups, like Augmedix, which uses Google Glass as a platform and Smart Patient, founded by former Google Chief Health Strategist Roni Zeiger. Some companies have just opened funding rounds and others have finished product trials and shared interesting data at the Demo Day.
Rock Health also announced that since the SEC lifted a ban on public fundraising announcements, like Smart Patients made during their presentation, it is partnering with online funding platform AngelList to create a special fund that will allow accredited investors the option to back the 10 companies that are graduating from Rock Health's program this week.
Companies shared updates on how they spent their time in Rock Health's program.
Amplify Health
Amplify Health's founder, Eric Page wrote in May that to increase adherence and eventually outcomes was to focus on building strong relationships between patients and providers. Through communication and data analysis, his company uses a pay-for-outcomes model to provide results and lower costs. At Demo Day, Page used the example of Economist Edwin Chadwick who convinced the British to fix the mortality rate of the prisoners they were shipping to Australia by paying the ship for how many people got off the boat alive. Today, Page said, the "ship captains of today are primary physicians."
While an "EMR is good at parroting back what should happen," his company will combine medical data of what should happen with claims data, which is what actually happens, and show outcomes. If the same person goes off the plan, fails to pickup medication and uses urgent care, Amplify Health finds these deviations and "helps patients avoid $50,000 mistakes". In June, MobiHealthNews reported Amplify Health already worked with one customer, Paladina Health Clinic. As of September, the team has at least worked with five, although Page only specifically named Redirect Health.
Anapsis
When Anapsis first entered the accelerator, Halle Tecco described it as "a research platform and marketplace for scientific and statistical computing." At Demo Day, Co-Founder Rustam Lalkaka could further elaborate on Tecco's description.
Before the company was conceived, Lalkaka developed a "cool drug toxicity algorithm" that he wanted to sell. A data software engineer at Microsoft, Lalkaka wasn't sure how he could share the algorithm online. His go-to file sharing sites didn't have the specifications to properly share and explain algorithms, which are big files. So he created Anapsis. His company is designed to help developers share algorithms with the comfort of knowing the software on which he sells the algorithm is secure.
Augmedix
Augmedix has received a fair amount of press attention since it was first announced due to its connection to Google's controversial and much-hyped augmented reality glasses project Google Glass. The company, whose founders have been among the lucky few to try out the high-tech specs, hoped to be first on the scene with a Google Glass app for medical doctors. Since then, quite a few use cases have come out for Google Glass, but on Demo Day Augmedix had grown considerably.
Co-Founder Ian Shakil told the audience Augmedix now has 20 employees, is venture backed, and is "hiring across the board". The company did a study to see if 300 patients at three different pilot sites would be comfortable if their doctors were using Google Glass, they found 99 percent were comfortable with it. When Augmedix launches, the patients won't just "walk into the room and see the doctor wearing Google Glass," the staff at Augmedix will explain the concept, why the doctor is wearing it and what kind of privacies the patient has. Shakil mentioned the doctor would take off the Google Glass if the patient was uncomfortable with it. Shakil believes Augmedix will re-humanize the doctor-patient experience.
CancerIQ
CancerIQ is a web-based data sharing platform for oncology-related data. According to its website, the company's big data platform "converts oncology data stored in unstructured enterprise data warehouses into research-quality data for secondary use". The system, which spun out of the University of Chicago, can incorporate and process genomic data as well as medical images.
As of Demo Day, Founder and CEO Feyi Olopade said the platform has integrated 7 million clinical records, tested 70,000 patients and partnered with the National Cancer Institute, Cleveland Clinic, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, University of Chicago, City of Hope and Fox Chase Center. So far CancerIQ has secured four paid pilots, and the company has four more on the waiting list.
CRIXLabs
CRIXLabs has developed a software platform called NuSilico, described in June as a program designed to help pharma companies find "the next blockbuster drug". Co-Founder Shalini Ananda said at Demo Day, CRIXLabs "is leveraging software technology to combat the costs in pharma". The software takes the drugs that make patients feel miserable, and instead of using complicated lab experiments, tests them through computer simulations and turns them into targeted and effective therapies, Ananda said. After 10 years of research in predictive analytics, Ananda said a test of NuSilico showed an experiment that took researchers 39 months to complete, NuSilico completed in one month.
Lift Labs
Lift Labs is building a smart spoon, among other things. But the company has a much more clinical focus than smart fork maker HAPILabs. Their spoon is one of several smart tools for combatting the tremors inherent in diseases like Parkinson's. The company also has Apple and Android apps available to measure tremors, Lift Pulse, and to help people with Parkinson's prevent shuffling as they walk, Lift Stride.
MobiHealthNews wrote about Lift Labs last week, when the company closed a funding round of $1 million and launched the product, which costs $295. At Demo Day, the company announced over 200 devices have been sold since the launch and a clinical trial of the product at University of Michigan found of the population tested, there was a 70 percent tremor reduction. The company also partnered with the International Essential Tremor Foundation to help people who can't afford to pay out of pocket for the product.
Sensentia
Sensentia describes itself on its website as "striving to enable the next paradigm of knowledge automation and computational reasoning." At the time, MobiHealthNews wrote that the company appears to be building an automated system for handling health insurance queries that are currently handled by human agents and had company already claimed Humana as a customer.
This week, Co-Founder Jan Jungclaus has much more to say about the product. Sensentia uses technology based on computational comprehension that can read text documents automatically and understand all basic information and structure. It automates complex tasks and processes associated with claims documents and insurance policies, which generally takes an average of three workweeks a year for physicians to complete. The company cites a 2:1 return on investment for providers.
Smart Patients
Smart Patients had already had already made news back in April when Google’s ex-Chief Health Strategist Roni Zeiger launched the startup. MobiHealthNews tagged this online community for cancer patients and care providers as one of the most high-profile startups in the new class. On Demo Day, company reminded the audience of its strategy, market research to create a clinical trial search engine in order to increase patient engagement, and then announced they are raising a seed round.
Spire
Spire is working on a wearable sensor that "tracks both physical and psychological fitness to lower stress and increase productivity," according to Rock Health. The device is designed to help people change the way they breathe. Since its entry into the accelerator, Spire has tested the product on employees at LinkedIn and found it improved productivity of 75 percent of the employees and improved focus of 2/3 of the employees. The company's next steps include doing pilots with the prototypes. They have planned a crowdfunding campaign beginning in 2014 and aim to launch the product by mid 2014.
ThriveOn
ThriveOn is a startup working on mobile mental health programs. Rock Health says the program uses a user assessment to identify the needs of the patient and create a custom program. The program is then delivered to a mobile app and all the steps are supported by remote mental health coach who delivers feedback. The company identified its first market and topic on demo day -- universities and body image.
After two years of research which included studying 3,000 students, the team noticed a 50 percent reduction in eating disorders in 20 percent of the therapists time at 10 percent of the cost. The Missouri Department of Mental Health gave ThriveOn a $2 million grant on behalf of the state's public universities to spread this program across the country. Soon ThriveOn will start distribution to 45 universities for a total of 400,000 students. Future use cases for the product include eating disorders, stress, anxiety, depression, and sleep issues.
