The healthcare industry will continue to be disrupted
By Drew Hendricks Contributor, Inc.com @DrewAHendricks
Healthcare in the United States and across the globe continues to improve, innovate and change how we handle and deal with our health on a daily basis. We used to only dream about a time when doctors could use 4D technology to monitor the blood flow in our hearts, or when we could enlist the help of a simple device right at the dinner table, to let us know exactly what we are putting into our bodies. Now, those once distance hopes have become reality, as each year we find new healthcare entrepreneurs that are changing the landscape of how we and the medical community take care of our bodies. As we flip the calendar to 2017, these are our top 20 healthcare entrepreneurs who are blazing a path to a healthier life for all of us.
Abhilash Patel
Abhilash is Co-founder of Recovery Brands, a company focused on providing consumers a way to search for addiction treatment online and provide tools for treatment providers to market their facilities. The company owns a series of websites, such as Rehabs.com, that include online directories, facility ratings and reviews, forums and professional communities for patients to make informed decisions about care. A successful serial entrepreneur, Abhilash prides himself on helping hundreds of thousands connect to the treatment they need. He is also an active investor and philanthropist.
Lee Akay
Founder and CEO of Fitgenetix, a multi-disciplinary Innovative Discovery Center company that offers functional genomics for personalized precision health. Fitgenetix combines genomic test results, personalized nutrition and meal planning, exercise plans and DNA based meal delivery services. Fitgenetix also provides coaching and an advanced genetic services platform; integrating lifestyle and clinical data with genetic interpretation. Lee Akay also served as a founding board member of the HealthTech Center, think-tank established to identify and educate member organizations on new trends in innovations and technologies that were aimed at transforming care.
Julie Taylor Cheek
A Harvard Business school grad, Julia Cheek, is co-founder and CEO of EverlyWell, a company focused on simplifying health testing and putting it into words and charts that everybody can understand. In addition to the detailed, easy to understand explanation, EverlyWell also includes curated suggestions of how to move forward with your wellness decisions, as well as personalized recommendations on how to progress with your lab results.
Shireen Yates
Co-Founder and CEO of Nima, Shireen Yates is a proud gluten-free foodie, due to multiple food allergies. Deciding to pursue her passion for helping people lead healthier lifestyles, Shireen Yates help found Nima. The goal being to create greater food transparency, alleviating the stress around unknown food ingredients and to make mealtime enjoyable again.
John Capobianco
President and chief marketing officer of Health Care Interactive (HCIactive), a healthcare technology company providing advanced health planning solutions, including facilitating direct contracting opportunities between healthcare systems and self-funded organizations. Other solutions include high-performance, well-being programs featuring online enrollment, wellness services, and integrated incentive management.
Fabien Beckers
Beckers is CEO and co-founder of Arterys, a 4-D flow medical imaging tech company building a precision medicine platform. The goal of Arterys is to offer a next-level, precise, non-invasive alternative to how we quantify blood flow in the human body. Beckers earned his PhD from Cambridge University and Master of Business degree from Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Prakash Chand
Co-founder and CEO of Ask The Doctor, a global platform for patients to seek reassurance, advice and direction about their medical concerns. Having passed the 5 million question milestone in 2016, Ask The Doctor looks to continue to grow, as it leads the way as the most trusted resource for personalized medical attention, serving patients from nearly every country around the world.
Kelly Close
President and founder of Close Concerns, a healthcare information company focused on diabetes and obesity. Kelly Close is also founder and chair of the board of The diaTribe Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to improving the lives of people with diabetes, and is editor-in-chief of diaTribe, an educational newsletter for people with diabetes. Kelly was also recognized in 2012 by the American Diabetes Association with the Excellence in Health Communications award.
Mick Correll
CEO of Genospace, a platform, helping research institutes, molecular diagnostic labs and pharmaceutical companies run precision medicine initiatives at scale. He was instrumental in the launch of the Center for Cancer Computational Biology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. Mick has held a variety of positions leading the development of enterprise software solutions for pharmaceutical, biotech and ag-bio companies, and government, community, and academic healthcare providers.
Michael Burcham
Burchman is an entrepreneur and healthcare CEO with over 20 years of experience leading disruptive and technology-enabled companies. Founder and CEO of Narus Health, a healthcare organization supporting individuals facing serious and life-limiting medical conditions. Burcham was previously founder and president of Theraphysics, a specialty care management firm focusing on orthopedics and rehabilitation.
Partha Unnava
In college, Partha Unnava broke his ankle and spent six weeks on crutches, leading him to found Better Walk to create a crutch that didn’t hurt a user’s armpits and other revolutionary medical devices. He is a well known as a public speaker, having spoken at dozens of conferences and events, where he shares his story, while educating audiences on fundraising, product development, and business strategy and mindsets.
Wade Diebner
Wade Diebner is the Managing Partner at ExCapsa Group, an investment banking, capital advisory and business insurance provider. By offering insurance to those young companies that they invest in, ExCapsa allows even the smallest of startups to offer benefits, including life insurance, to their very first employees and founders. By removing the fear of health emergencies, both for themselves and for their families, and other emergencies, Diebner and ExCapsa group are setting a new standard in the world of startups, and are paving the way towards a healthier technology sector for America.
Amrit Chaudhuri
Amrit Chaudhuri is the CEO and founder of Mass Innovation Labs, the biggest bench-on-demand shared work space for biotech startups, located in the heart of the nation’s biotech innovation space: Kendall Square, a square mile neighborhood in Cambridge, MA. In addition to making the space and specific facilities – including clean rooms and animal testing centers (through Charles River) – available, Mass Innovation Labs also acts as its tenants’ Chief Operating Officer, which alleviates the need to bring on non-science employees early on. His space has allowed many new biotech innovations that may have been snuffed out by rent costs to flourish, including the breakthrough gene-editor, CRISPR technology.
Dr. Kevin Knopp
Dr. Kevin Knopp is the CEO and co-founder of 908 Devices, the company that is making mass spectrometry available to thousands of labs that previously could not accommodate the technology. By making it less expensive, smaller and easier to use, Knopp and the 908 Devices team has not only made our soldiers’ lives safer by providing more accurate chemical threat detectors, they’ve also pushed lab testing for healthcare providers forward by leaps and bounds by dramatically improving what scientists can see with their MS instruments and transforming time-consuming sample runs into fast, high-quality analysis.
Jukka Peltola
Jukka Peltola is a Finnish entrepreneur that wants to spark a new wave of food businesses that take responsibility for public health. He’s the CEO and founder of Goodio, a health-conscious snacks and treats manufacturer that specializes in raw chocolates. He made the transition to food after what seemed to be an upwardly mobile career in game design – he worked for Rovio, the powerhouse that created Angry Birds – and attributes the sudden shift to realizing that chocolate can be healthy, if produced right. We can’t fault that logic!
Chris Hollindale
Chris Hollindale is the CEO and co-founder of Zesty, a company that offers healthy catering for offices in the San Francisco area, and which has plans to expand in the future. Started by Hollindale and his partner Langer, the goal of Zesty is to make office catered lunches so much more than soggy sandwiches and excessive amounts of birthday cake. With Zesty, companies can order from a variety of restaurants in the area, and receive details nutrition facts that are shown with the food. This is a great solution for offices that occasionally host celebrations, but makes the biggest impact with the growing trend of tech brands that cater lunch for their employees every day.
Dr. Rodger Novak
Dr. Rodger Novak is the co-founder and CEO of CRISPR Therapeutics. Simply put, his company is forging the path to gene editing technologies that could rid humanity of its worst genetic ailments. CRISPR Therapeutics’ mission is to be able to edit gene sequences to eliminate diseases like cancer, Huntington’s Disease, hemophilia, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, and more.
Joel Gibbard
Joel Gibbard is the CEO and founder of Open Bionics, a company that’s disrupting the prosthetics industry by 3D printing affordable, functional designs. Gibbard’s goal is to twofold: show that robotics can be used for human good, and, of course, to provide low-cost but high value prosthetics to those who need them around the world.
Dan Simons
Dan Simons is the owner of Founding Farmers, one of the most famous restaurants in Washington, D.C. Simons has dedicated his life to raise industry standards for the restaurant market as well as a pioneer in incorporating sustainability methods and local initiatives in an effort to help farmers. By being an advocate for the farming community, as well as removing the middlemen between farmers and their customers, Simons is changing the way we eat to include fresher ingredients, better tasting food, and a purpose to help others.
Thomas Goetz
Thomas Goetz, the CEO and co-founder of Iodine, is working to make our pharmaceuticals more effective through the power of communication. Iodine is an app that users can access on their smartphones, and report how certain drugs, from antidepressants to birth control, are affecting them, any side effects, and so on. While this isn’t that helpful with some medications, like antibiotics, it can be a literal lifesaver when it comes to mental health and pregnancy treatments.
