April 15, 2025 • 55 mins
Managing chronic and multiple health conditions, or comorbidities even, can be extremely challenging when your health records sit with double digit numbers of providers and various health systems. To fully understand your visits, your diagnoses, all the doctors you are seeing and the meds you are taking, is far too much to have in multiple places. But that’s the typical situation for many living with chronic health conditions. But enter Guava Health to truly bring it all together in one place, in one app. Isabel dives into the details of how this app functions and makes so many lives so much easier than they’ve ever experienced before.
Resources: Follow Guava Health on LinkedIn, Instagram and Tik Tok Check out their website and download their app online here.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:21):
This is Healthcare Uprising.
We are here to shine a light on the
innovators implementing positive change
in American healthcare and the
patient experience stories, good and bad,
that can help others navigate the
sometimes overwhelmingly complex
American healthcare system.
(00:43):
Welcome to the uprising.
We are not doctors and we don't play one
on TV. If you need medical advice,
consult with your physician or a
healthcare professional.
(01:04):
All right. Hello, health
heads. Welcome and thank you for checking
in to this dose of the healthcare
uprising. I'm your producer in the back,
Jeremy Carr, here with your host in the
front row, Heather Pierce. So what is
on our agenda for today, Heather?This
week I'm super excited to chat with
Isabel Stewart. She's the head of product
for Guava Health and also a founding team
(01:26):
member of Guava Health. Guava is
dedicated to building tools that empower
people to take control of their health. A
graduate of the University of Vermont
with a degree in molecular genetics,
Isabel spent time in wet labs at the
University of Vermont, as well as the
Jackson Laboratory in. Bahaba
Maine Bahaba. How'd I do?You said that
(01:48):
pretty well. Thank you. I could tell
you're not native, but better than most
would do with it with the Bahaba.
So Isabel then joined Amazon Alexa,
where she worked on the health vertical
as a knowledge engineer, working with
large data sets to deliver answers to
critical health questions, from
medication side effects to pandemic
(02:08):
updates. I realized as soon as I said
Amazon Alexa that I looked around to make
sure I didn't have one of my. Alexa's in
here because she might have asked us a
question. Yeah, yeah, there you
go. During COVID-19,
Isabelle spearheaded Alexa's
information response, ensuring users
globally had timely and accurate
(02:29):
information about symptoms, local case
counts, and more. So this is one of the
people behind Alexa. Yeah. Oh, that's
wild. Yeah, really cool. So at Guava
Health, Isabelle combines her passion for
health and technology, working closely
with end users who are patients. To
create solutions that improve health
management and quality of life. So
another total rock star on our show
(02:50):
again. So let's go one genius after
another on here. Yep, pretty much. It's
like a Mensa convention in here.
I don't know what I'm doing here. I just
have. I just own some microphones. Yeah,
that's basically it.
All right. Well, without further ado,
let's get into it. Here is Isabel from
Guava.
(03:16):
Hi, Isabel. Thanks and welcome to
Healthcare Uprising Podcast. We're
excited to have you on the show today.
I'm excited to be here. Thank you. Great.
Well, let's jump right into it and tell
us a little bit about your background,
your experience, what drove you to join
and help build Guava Health and
and really kind of what your story is and
(03:38):
and and what you're here to do. Sure.
I'm Isabel. I'm head of product at Guava.
My background is actually in molecular
genetics and microbiology. And I
spent a lot of time in wet lab research,
which is hanging out with mice a lot of
the time. And after a little while, I
realized that I enjoyed human interaction
(03:59):
a little bit too much to make a career
out of that. So I switched over to
tech and engineering world. I joined
Amazon. right after college
and the pandemic hit. And because of
my background in health, prior to that, I
was on the health vertical for Amazon
Alexa. So during the
(04:20):
pandemic, I ended up running a
lot of Alexa's responses. So I worked
with Reuters, I worked with AP, I worked
with Hopkins to deliver
as up-to-date information as possible on
the pandemic. And that was a really
eye-opening experience and kind of got me
moreinundated into the health
ecosystem. And after that
(04:41):
phase of my career past, I ended up
connecting with the co-founders of Guava
who had also worked with me at Amazon.
And they told me about this really cool
project and startup that they were
working on. I was like, oh my gosh, how
do I join?You are working on this really
amazing thing that can help so many
people. Um And you guys have
such a great tech background and I would
(05:02):
love to be a part of it in any way that
That looks like. So that's kind of how I
ended up joining Guava. And a few months
after that, when I was, it
was early days Guava and I was doing a
lot of early interviews for people's
personal experiences navigating the
healthcare space because really what
Guava was at that point was we were
building a foundation for solving an
(05:24):
information problem. So we were building
out integrations with. The VA or
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, My
Chart, Cerner, Epic, et cetera. And
so one of the people that I chatted with
was someone I had gone to high school
with, Emily, who now works at Guava as
well. And she had posted on social media
about how she had chronic
(05:45):
Lyme and three tick-borne illnesses and
toxic mold poisoning, and how it was
only through the fact that she
had. The accessibility and the
funds to be able to go out of network for
these providers that she was able to get
a diagnosis and that was a really
impactful conversation I would say and
kind of switched my thinking about what
(06:07):
Guava could be. And so we really took
that back to the team and said hey like.
There is this absolute need in this
chronic condition space of people who are
spending 10 years to get a diagnosis and
don't know where all of their records
live. And so let's really try to focus on
solving these really hard problems about
integrating all this information into one
place and see what we can build out to
(06:28):
try to improve the quality of life for
people who have these chronic conditions,
whether they're diagnosed or trying to
get a diagnosis.
Wow. Yeah, sorry, this was a
long, long walk. No, that's that's
amazing. You know, I know a little bit
about Guava, and so
that's a great setup, I think, for kind
(06:49):
of understanding maybe the
impetus behind Guava Health and how it
came to be, and the fact that you are
working in a lab with mice, and then you
end up working in the healthcare vertical
of Amazon Alexa. So like when I ask a
question, hey, as
we like to call Dr. Google, right,
(07:09):
why does, I don't know. Why is my
myWhy do I have a headache when I do
XYZ?Like you're gonna like you were.
That's a really dumb, probably lame
example, but do you come
up with the prom or the responses on that?
Is that what you were doing there?Yeah.
So ohh we worked in structured
(07:30):
data sets for the most part. I was a
knowledge engineer, which means
absolutely nothing to most people. But it
basically means that I dealt with
structured data sets and worked within a
knowledge graph. And so when you asked
Alexa a question like, why do I get
headaches or is a
headache a side effect of Zoloft?
(07:51):
That is something that Alexa
understands as a prompt or a question
where it's like, does X cause Y or
is XA side effect of Y
that gets fed into the system and then I
will have worked something on the back
end or another version of me work
something on the back end to surface the
hopefully correct answer from a reputable
(08:14):
source, because that's really important
because we don't want to be serving
inaccurate information. So,
so you've worked in labs, you did
that. Obviously you're learning a great
deal of knowledge about very clinical
things, I imagine in that.
And then you come to Guava and I want you
to tell us a little bit more about what
actually Guava does, but I do want to
(08:36):
kind of circle back at some point. Oh my
God, I just dropped corporate jargon. I
am going to apologize for that
immediately. There is no place for that
here. Rewind.
Make sure you add in the rewind sound,
Jeremy, on that one. Perfect.
I do want to come back to that though,
because how that has
(08:57):
made you so qualified
and knowledgeable in in kind of,
you know, Guava Health's, you know,
objectives, right?Like the ultimate goal.
Having that kind of knowledge because,
you know, medical conditions are complex.
So let's talk about next. Just tell us
really, what is Guava Health doing?Like
(09:18):
tell us about the app kind of, you know,
the purpose, the goals, everything. Yeah.
So Guava does a lot.
It at its core is solving an information
problem. So in the US at
least all of the different patient
portals that you have. Are likely
completely separate things. So the
(09:38):
information that exists on the patient
portal that you see in hospital A is
completely separate information from what
you see on the patient portal in hospital
B and hospital C and hospital D And
people have this conception in their
head that all of their providers have
access to this information and all they
have to do is look up your name in this
massive database and that database. Does
(10:01):
not exist in the US It should and it
doesn't. There are some countries who are
better at it than we are, but
because of that, it's really up to the
individual patient or person to make
sure that their providers are informed
and have all of this information. And if
you're a really healthy individual, then
it kind of matters a lot less at that
(10:21):
particular moment in time that provider A
and provider B have that same level of
information on you. But if you're trying
to get a diagnosis or if you are
trying multiple different types of meds
that have been prescribed from different
providers, then it matters a lot more.
And so Guava helps you integrate and keep
those integrations live with.
(10:41):
connections to your patient portal at
hospital A and your patient portal at
hospital B and then your fitness devices
and your medical devices like Dexcom and
Libre and allows you to track your
symptoms and set med reminders and track
your cycle and all that information
because you are a whole person. It's not
just the clinical data. It's not just the
(11:02):
fitness data. It's not just the symptoms.
It's like all of this packaged into one
Single singular place. And then with
that you're able to one, understand more
about your own health and then two, help
your providers help you at the end of the
day because they have the information in
a way that they can understand really
quickly as well. And so that's kind of
(11:25):
the core problem I would say that Guava
is solving because we've moved
on a little bit from the foundations and
we're able to kind of. dive a little
bit deeper into what we can do now that
we have this data so we can help you
discover insights like, is air pressure
actually affecting your headaches?Or is
that, I don't know, spaghetti and
(11:47):
meatballs that you eat every Friday
impacting your stomach aches on Saturday
morning?And so we've really kind
of migrated into
more of empowering the individual
to get answers and to understand their
health more.
It seems to be a now recurring
(12:07):
theme on a lot of our subject
matter here that healthcare in America
is is going towards a point where people
have to start figuring it out for
themselves and then let their doctor know
what's wrong. At home
testing. We've done some at home testing
stuff and with these apps that
are tracking things for everybody and
(12:27):
like figuring out their problems. It's
it's almost like a bittersweet thing.
It's very cool that we're starting to
have the technology. It's very Star Trek.
You can hold your doctor in your hand and
and it can tell you what's wrong. But at
the same time, what does it say about our
actual healthcare system and our
interaction with our doctors and the
whole process and you know, the actual
(12:49):
IRL healthcare process?
That's the bitter part, I guess. Yeah,
I I have so many thoughts on our
healthcare system. Yeah,
we do too. Yeah. I mean, you guys are
doing this podcast for a reason. Exactly.
I I think it's both a
(13:10):
wonderful thing that we are giving.
More power to individuals, not just
Guava obviously, but as you mentioned at
home health tests and kits as well.
And there's other services that are that
are really trying to upend the current
status quo to make life better for
individuals. But it is really
frustrating, just all of the red tape and
(13:33):
all of the bureaucracy within the
healthcare system to make change.
And so it's really. We have to
collectively, and I think we're not the
only ones who realize this, like we have
to work from the patient forward rather
than trying the health system first.
Because when it goes into the health
system, they're already inundated with
so many things that they have to do. Like
(13:54):
providers get to spend 12 minutes of
their 30 minute appointment actually
talking with a patient and the rest of it
is charting or making sure that all of
the the notes are sent over for the
referrals or whatever it is. And so it's
been. A really interesting process,
working patient first rather than trying
(14:14):
to change things within the healthcare
ecosystem 1st and hoping that has a
trickle down effect. The system itself, I
mean I've always, you know, and I come
from the the carrier side. Well, I did
anyway. I worked in that space for a long
time and I always described it as it was
like turning the Titanic, right?Like it's
just, it's so big, it's so clunky, it's
so complex. There's a bazillion things
(14:37):
going on, right?So many different things
that are happening that kind of bubble up
to the top there that the patient has
kind of gotten a little bit
forgotten, excuse me, a little bit
forgotten in the process, right. So, but
I love the way that the, the, I love
the way that the industry quote UN quote
(14:57):
is shifting to become more consumer
friendly, which I've never, you know,
I've worked in the healthcare industry
since 2002 and so to see that
change. And to give people power
and empowerment and decision making
around their healthcare is a is a pretty
beautiful thing to see. And
digital technology A I
(15:20):
is is really I think the catalyst for
that. So and people getting sick and
tired quite honestly. Yeah, I think, I
think A I will hopefully be a huge.
Relief for the strains on the
system, because AI can kind of be
the first line of defense for people
trying to find answers. And so they don't
(15:40):
have to go to the Uh or urgent care or
try to schedule an appointment that will
cost them $60.00 a $100 for
5 minutes of a provider's time and
instead can utilize AI to get
some. answers, and then they can take
that initial research to talk with a
person. I don't think we'll ever lose
that human connectedness within the
(16:01):
provider ecosystem, but I do think that
there is so much good that AI can do.
And it's been really fascinating kind of
looking at the different perspectives,
whether you're on the patient side and
what AI means for you versus if you're on
the provider side or the administration
side, and what AI means for them
and what AI means in like a hospital
(16:21):
setting. So it's a really exciting time
and and I'm really excited to see what
the world looks like, honestly, in a
year from now or two years from now.
Yeah, me too. It is. I tell
everybody to work in healthcare right now
is maybe the most exciting time that at
least I can remember. Again, I've been
(16:41):
I've been around the block for a while,
but I love being a part of it so much
that I don't I don't want to leave
because we're part of the we're part of
the uprising. Yeah. I mean, we are.
That's what this podcast is about is talk
with folks like you and what you're
doing. And and
Jeremy, did you have a question?I'll let
you plug. Actually, I I just wanted to
(17:02):
say as someone who's not in the
healthcare industry, I am
glad to hear this much positivity coming
from two people who are right now, at
least in this capacity and
the fact that this, this technology is
going to give people the ability to kind
of take control of their own healthcare
and understand their own health. In a way
that we've never been able to do before
(17:24):
that that is pretty exciting. It's
exciting. So
let's talk a little bit more about Guava
Health too in terms of what, you know,
this app, you know, and the capabilities
that it has, which is really pulling
together a lot of a lot of
information in somebody's medical record
into one place, right. And then kind of
(17:45):
seeing some cause and effect things,
right. Like if I do this, this is. I'm
seeing my blood pressure go up if, you
know, they're tracking that way. Are
there certain people or people with
certain types of illnesses or conditions
that the app is really well suited
for?You know, does it make sense?
Does it make sense for somebody who's
really well to use it?I mean, maybe it's
(18:06):
more of like preventive care, right?So I
guess, I don't know, let's maybe talk
through that a little bit. Yeah. So Guava
is. ideally built for everyone. Um
My parents who are in their 70s use it.
I definitely will help them here with
like what button to press, but but
they're they're capable and competent
(18:27):
enough to be able to to navigate the app
pretty much on their own. And then we
also have functionality and features for
new parents for their kids. And so it
really is a a whole family
experience. I would say
thatFor right now,
the people who find the most value, it
seems like just based on people reaching
out to us, are people who are navigating
(18:49):
the healthcare system a lot. And that
usually means that they have more than
one chronic condition and they're seeing
51015. 30 different
providers within a six month period or a
year period. And so they have a lot of
information that is really challenging
for them to keep track of and they have
all these symptoms that they're
experiencing. And when you're sitting in
(19:10):
front of a provider and they're doing the
rapid fire questions of how many
headaches have you had this week or
what's the severity or what's the
frequency and you get nervous and you
black out, then you have to kind of
repeat that exact same experience five
times over to finally get an answer. And
so Guava has really. Kind of bridged that
communication gap for a lot of people
where that data just exists and we've put
(19:32):
it into a format that both a user like
you and I can use and also provider can
look at it and immediately understand the
relevant information that can allow them
to give the best care possible. So it is
technically a whole family app,
but in practice it's definitely people
who have chronic condition to have found
(19:52):
the most value out of it. That
makes sense. And I I know you mentioned
my chart, which I think obviously plays a
big role in terms of bringing in medical
records and if someone's seeing 15
doctors, Oh my gosh, that's crazy in one
year. It's like mind-blowing. I've never
had any like long-term chronic conditions
or anything like that. So I I know people
(20:13):
who have, but can you talk
about?And maybe explain a little bit more
about how Mychart plays into this in
terms of the medical records. So like I
can go into the office and be like, hey,
I've got everything I need to know from
every visit that I have. Like, how does
that work?Yeah. So the way that
Guava works with Mychart
is that Mychart is a patient portal and
(20:34):
Mychart accounts for, I want to say
50 to 60% of patient portals across the
US So they are definitely one of the
biggest, if not the biggest player.
Cerner is another heavy hitter, but.
What that really means is that all of
their the hospitals that use MyChart
all still have separate MyCharts and
(20:55):
they've gotten better. And so now they
have, I think it's called Care Everywhere
or the Epic Orchard, and you're able
to, providers are able to see records
from across other MyChart accounts for
you, but they still don't have access to
your information that exists in Cerner or
Hilo or AllScripts or your device data.
(21:16):
AndSo Guava allows for that integration
of not just the MyChart information, but
also all of the other patient portals
that you have and your medical and
fitness devices. Um And
something that we've heard too, that has
actually been really eye-opening because
similar to you, I don't have
15 separate doctors that I see. I have,
(21:37):
I want to say five or six, but
I'm prettyLike, I know kind of what's
wrong with me. And so when I look at my
condition list, I'm like, oh, yeah, this
makes sense. Or my active Med list. I'm
like, oh, yeah, like I'm actively taking
all of those. But when people who have
all of these different providers who
exist in different systems and patient
portals aren't built for the patient,
(21:58):
right?Like they were originally built for
billing and a lot of people don't know
that. And so the actual user experience
for this is really challenging for
patients to navigate. And so they found
that with Guava, the way that we're
structuring the information for them.
They have found conditions that they
didn't even realize they had a diagnosis
for, and it was diagnosed from a
(22:19):
provider that they saw five years ago and
it was a diagnosis they were that they
were actually spending a lot of money to
get a diagnosis for currently.
And that is not an uncommon thing that
people have mentioned or they've talked
about meds that they've tried and they
can't remember the name. And so a
provider will be like, oh, try this. Med
(22:39):
and it's something that they've already
tried before. And so using Guava is
actually a way for that
information to be shared with their
current providers because it exists in a
siloed system that those providers don't
currently have. So hold
on, I don't know if you
saw my face, but it was like, wow, pick
(23:00):
my job off the ground. Legitimately,
people are finding out, yeah, by using
Guava. When medical records are then
loaded into this app and they're reading
them that they were diagnosed with
conditions but not told. Yes, got
it. I've had,
I've had like a couple dozen people reach
(23:20):
out in the past few months. mentioning
kind of in that same vein, like, oh, I've
been trying to get a diagnosis for this
thing and no one believes me. And it it
turns out that it was an actual
diagnosis from a doctor that they had
seen years prior, but that information
didn't exist in the current healthcare
system that they were in because they had
(23:40):
moved. And so- It didn't carry
over essentially?Exactly. Okay. Yeah,
because they existed in different
systems. And so you pretty much kind of
start fresh. Like when you see a new
provider, it's kind of whatever
information you give them in that first
20 to 30 minute appointment, and then
everything moving forward. And it's like
nothing before kind of carries over
(24:01):
unless you tell them. But if you don't
know you have that diagnosis, then it
doesn't exist to that new provider.
This has been one of the big problems in
healthcare, right, is is the information
pathways where like
places don't sharePatient info properly
and different doctors don't know what's
(24:21):
going on with the patient. Sounds like
you guys solved that. You actually found
one spot that can get all the
information together so you can get an
actual clear picture of what's going on
with the patient. Yeah, that's a huge
step forward, isn't it?Like, I know I'm
not the healthcare guy here, but no,
that's a big deal. I mean, that's a big
problem that's been they've been trying
to solve for a long time. It sounds like
(24:42):
you solved it. Yeah. Well, we're
definitely trying our best. A lot of it
still is, is definitely patient driven.
So the hospital institutions right now
can't do it themselves. It still requires
an individual to be like, yeah, I want to
pull my records from patient portal A and
patient portal B and patient portal C,
but once it exists in Guava, it's
(25:02):
continuously updating. And so if you go
see a provider at any of those
institutions, information will
automatically be. Added into the Guava
ecosystem. And if you share that with
your provider, then they will have the
up-to-date information on you, which is
why people who have all these conditions
really love it because it means that they
can spend less time monologuing or trying
(25:22):
to articulate what's going on. And it's
just like, here's the data, here are my
questions and here's what I'm hoping to
get out of this appointment. Can I
ask like what?What are the main
problems?Do you know?I don't know if you
even have stats on this, but like. What
kind of chronic conditions are most
popular, the most popular
users of your app of Guava?
(25:44):
Do you do you have stats on that?Like
what?What elements are the most tracked
or anything like that?Yeah, so
we have a lot of people who have
Ehlers Danlos syndrome.
POTS. And I don't know if you've heard of
these conditions, they're on the yeah,
they're on the more rare side. And they
tend to affect
(26:05):
women between the ages of I want to say
16 and 35, 40.
And I think that kind of just is in line
withWhere
our audience is or our user base
is, it tends to skew female. And I don't
part of that I think is just they see
myself or they see Emily on social media
(26:26):
and they're like, oh, another female. And
I think a larger part of that is that
females tend to have
a lower diagnosis rate and it takes
them longer to get a diagnosis and they
have those more rare or underfunded or
under researched conditions. And so it's
really they. I don't want to call
out providers because I I do truly love
(26:48):
providers and a lot of them do a world of
good. But historically with our user
base, like so many of them have felt
gaslit and so many of them have just been
absolutely ping ponged throughout the
system of like it's probably anxiety or
it's probably in your head or it's
probably your anxiety or your bipolar
disorder that is causing you to think
that you have this physical ailment when
(27:08):
in reality like. both things can be true.
You can have anxiety or another mental
health condition, and you can also have
this other physical condition. And so
that tends to be where our user base
seems to be. It's like younger
females who
need this resource to be taken seriously
(27:29):
when navigating the healthcare space.
So it's almost like
the the rare conditionsYou need it
more because it's so much easier for them
to slip through the cracks. Yeah, is what
I got from that or be misdiagnosed or
underdiagnosed or not diagnosed. Yeah,
(27:51):
I mean, so many people, they'll go
through like 3 or 4 different and I
didn't know that. of the thing. But like
so many people will go through multiple
diagnoses before actually getting to the
diagnosis that is what's causing
their slew of symptoms. And I
kind of had this assumption just based on
my own really lucky care where if a
provider's like, this is what you have,
(28:13):
or this is what I think you have, that's
what I have. um And in reality, that's
not necessarily true. Like people will go
walking around with a diagnosis that to
your point is a misdiagnosis for years,
and it will take them even longer to get
the accurate diagnosis and then get onto
a track of getting a treatment or a
therapy that's actually going to be
effective for them.
(28:36):
And I mean I have to imagine too and and
I'd love to hear kind of the feedback on
this and and also just a quick plug,
we're going to be meeting with Doctor Cat
McGraw from Guava Health, your new chief
medical officer in a separate episode
where we'll get a lot more into the
clinical pieces and you know her
perspective. But I have to imagine
the providers who have the
(28:58):
patients who are using Guava and they're
coming in and they're like, hey, it's
like all right here. They've
got to be grateful, right?Because they're
limited in time, right?It's not, you
know, providers or doctors want a doctor,
right?Most do, right.
And unfortunately, the system itself
has made it more and more harder for
(29:19):
them to do that. And so I have to
imagine, you know, just like the limited
amount of time that they have with their
patients. So I have to imagine that this
app and the information and the
capabilities it has makes. Things
better for them too. Like what kind of
feedback have you gotten on that part?
It's been really interesting. So one of
the first projects that I worked with
(29:41):
with Doctor McGraw, who is
an awesome individual, she's she's great,
was the visit prep experience. And the
reason for that was because
she came from the provider perspective
and I already had a pretty good glean. Of
what was going on or what was wrong from
the patient perspective. And I guess
(30:02):
I can go into a little bit of background
of this, but I had lunch with a
man whose 6 year old daughter had a brain
tumor and he knew that something was
wrong and went to provider after provider
after provider for this six year old. And
all of them were like, oh, it's fine that
she's clumsy. That's a normal 6 year old
behavior. Oh, it's fine that she's
falling down the stairs or that she's
(30:22):
forgetting words like that's. She's six.
It's normal. And it took him
talking to one of her teachers who said,
I exist with five and six-year-olds every
day, all day for the past 15 years. Like
what your child is experiencing, that's
not normal. And so you, when you go to a
provider, you should say these specific
words and tell them that their teacher
(30:45):
noticed something was wrong. And so it
took this third party individualto
basically tell him what to say to a
provider, for a provider to take him
seriously enough to then go get an MRI.
Once they got the MRI, she had a tumor
the size of a clementine. And then it was
like, you know, care kind of just
unraveled from there in a in a good way.
(31:06):
Like he was finally taken seriously,
obviously, but it was immediate. Like she
was helicoptered to
the tier one hospital. But
From that conversation and talking with
Kat, there's clearly a breakdown of
information sharing between the patient,
who thinks that they're doing a really
great job of telling the provider what's
(31:26):
wrong, and the provider is looking for
very specific keywords. They're
looking for things like dull, ache,
burning, radiating when you're trying to
describe your pain. And even though those
are common words in our dictionary, it's
not necessarily a common word for you
to describe how you're feeling. And so
the visit prep was created with that in
(31:48):
mind to bridge that information gap of
like. okay, here's the symptom that
you're experiencing. With these default
adjectives, how would you describe it and
what is the severity?And then if you've
been logging for two weeks worth of
time, you can create a visit prep and
it's delivered in a way that is one to
two pages long, and the providers really
(32:10):
love that because we're not the first
tracking app on the scene, right?Like
there are so many other symptom trackers
out there or med trackers, and for them,
they're overwhelmed with information.
Like they can spend hours
scrolling to find a needle in the
haystack in their MyChart or a
CSV file. Like they don't want to look at
that. And so the visit prep was built
(32:32):
with Dr. McGraw in a way that providers
are like, oh, I can immediately see
what's wrong with you. Like, thank you so
much for giving me exactly what I needed.
And now we can just spend time talking
because this is... It's built in a way
that they are already familiar with from
Med school training and charting. And
so it allows the patient to actually feel
(32:53):
heard and the provider to have the
information that is going to help them
because it's like, OK, the headache is
described as dull and it's the severity
and it's this frequency. And here are the
meds that this person has tried and here
is the relevant active conditions or
active meds that are on their list.
That's great to hear. That's good stuff.
(33:16):
You know, as you were talking, I was
thinking a little bit more too about, and
and you've already shared a little bit, I
think touching on how this app has
made people's lives a little bit more
manageable, particularly those with
chronic conditions. I hadn't thought
about it. You had mentioned, you know,
like a parent managing their kids,
(33:37):
especially when they're younger, you
know, vaccines and all that kind of stuff
or, you know, whatever else is going on.
But in terms of
like, I don't know, outcomes, trends,
like what are you seeing that is exciting
and amazing or even surprising for that
matter for like your users, maybe
(33:57):
that's through member testimonials, maybe
that's just through data that you guys
are collecting. I would say
something that I'm I personally love
seeing is when people are utilizing
the visit prep experience. That's
obviously a feature and functionality
close to my heart, but it's been really
amazing when people will e-mail us
(34:18):
or Instagram DM us or TikTok DM us
and be like, Hey, I used the Visit Prep
experience and for the first time ever, I
actually feel validated by my provider
and not just brushed off or not just
like, oh, you seem like a complicated
case. I'm going to push you off to the
next person. And that has been
amazing to see because it does really
(34:40):
It takes one good conversation with the
provider to completely change the
trajectory of someone's healthcare
experience, right?Like that's all it
takes. And I think that providers kind of
forget that and and they sometimes feel
like they are just another cog in the
machine. And so being able to help
facilitate a good conversation to make
one person's life easier is
(35:01):
really amazing for for me personally,
something that's surprising, I would say.
And we recently launched something called
the Insights Hub. So it's a public page.
You can go check it out, but it's where
people are sharing their statistically
statistically significant correlations
that they discovered through Guava. And
(35:22):
so it's the, you know, higher air
pressure and increased headaches or
eating dairy and stomach aches. And
so it's been really fun to see all of
these different people sharing those
stats and correlations and they can tag.
conditions that they have that they think
might be related. And so I'll go on to
(35:43):
the Ehlers-Danlos page, not the EDS page,
the Ehlers-Danlos page and scroll through
and see what are common correlations that
people are sharing within that group
that seem to be patterns.
And that's really exciting because again,
it's an under research condition. And so
it's really putting power into patients
(36:03):
or consumers or usersTo get
answers or to find answers just through
the power of the population and the power
of the people. That's
amazing. It's like this could potentially
discover the causality of things that
we don't even really know have a direct
cause, like dietarily or
(36:25):
something like like you eat these two
things together, it's going to cause this
problem. This might actually
like discover new things to
avoid and like. Wow. And yeah,
that's kind of mind boggling. Yeah. Can
you repeat where that is, what that is
again, the website or
insights, insights, insights like
(36:46):
insight hub. Gotcha. OK. And
that's is that part of the Guava Health
kind of online ecosystem. So you have to
be a member user of Guava to to access
that. No. So it's actually public.
Oh, it is public. Okay. Yeah. And it's
based on people. It's only what people
have said that they want to share.
So I have correlations that I'm like, eh,
(37:07):
I don't, this doesn't seem like it would
help anyone else. I'm just going to keep
it to myself or I'm not comfortable
sharing it or whatever it is. And then
the I've probably shared 50 or 60
correlations at this point and other
people have done the same. And so it's a
public page and we're organizing it right
now based on conditions. So EDS
(37:28):
or POTS or endometriosis
or PCOS or long covid. And then
people can kind of sift through those
correlations where it's like common
symptoms that people are sharing
or common therapies that people are
trying out and seeing whether or not it
has a positive or negative effect on
their own joint pain. Um And
(37:51):
within the guava ecosystem,Guava will
surface what we think are relevant
correlations to you based on your own
information and based on the conditions
that you have and based on correlations
that you have. And so that is unique to
being a Guava user.
And Guava right now, if we can talk about
(38:12):
kind of how it's, you know,
accessible, is it a pretty much like a
direct to consumerapp at this point?And
is is that the plan to to really just
kind of remain that way?Or is there any
plans to look into like Medicare,
Medicaid, you know, employer benefit
plans, things like that?Yeah, I mean, I
think it'd be awesome to partner with
(38:32):
organizations. For us, something that
is really important to the founding team
as a whole and and just generally
everyone on the team is that we make sure
that our incentives are always aligned
with the end user and the end user is
It's It's people. It is not a
healthcare institution. It's not a
healthcare administrator. It is not a
(38:53):
provider. We would love if as a
secondary consequence of Guava, we do
make the provider's life easier, or we
make it easier to navigate the
healthcare system regardless of who you
are within that system. But it's really
important to us that our business model
aligns with the end user
(39:13):
rather than just a B2B business.
Business exchange. Yeah.
Well, healthcare is human, right?So,
yeah, that's that's what the uprising's
all about, right?That's why we're here.
Bring it to the people, man. Very, very
aligned.
And now the dogs are barking. The dogs
(39:35):
are. I can't hear anything. Oh, good. OK,
just go ahead. I'm just going to keep
going. So. You mentioned the
Insights Hub, obviously making
providers' lives easier is a big goal.
Are there any other like big changes
coming, like in terms of, I don't know,
product changes or anything like that
that you can talk about or that are in
(39:56):
development even?
Umm I would say the Insights Hub is a big
one. I would say in
2025, we
do want tokind of focus on the
provider experience a little bit more.
And that has come because a lot of
the providers that we work with are
(40:17):
patients themselves, because we're in the
rare condition space. So that has kind of
been a happy accident for us,
not so happy, or I guess a coincidence
would be a better word of it than
anything else. And so we
want to make it so that people who
areproviding care and who are
doctors or who are nurses in these more
(40:39):
rare condition spaces have an easier time
getting the information that they need to
deliver care fast. I went to
the Ehlers-Danlos Society
Conference in July, and there
are, I can count on one hand how many EDS
specialists there are in the state of
Wisconsin. And one of them was a speaker
at this conference, and he has a wait
(40:59):
list of four years, um which is insane.
Four years just to see him and and so if
we can help expedite
his efforts and his care by
helping patients come prepared for
everything that he is looking for, then
that would be great. And so that's
something that I'm looking forward to in
2025. We're always looking to improve
(41:22):
the correlations experience, something
that we're actively working on and
have launched but are going to continue
improving is. the Guava Assistant, and
that's kind of where AI
is used within the Guava ecosystem. And
so you can ask questions to the Guava
Assistant around your own health
information. So for me, it's like,
(41:42):
I'll have a headache and I'll ask
it, is there anything in my ActiveMed
list that could possibly be a trigger
for my headaches?
Or how manyback
pain spasms have I had in the past
month?Or what was the last time
that I had my blood pressure read and
(42:03):
what was the number of it?So it's really
getting personalized information,
insights based on your own
information and and what you've put into
the Guava ecosystem. So
today,The Guava app
exists. Anyone can go online, right?
Any of us humans out there
(42:24):
and you know, sign up and and I
understand there's a free version and
then there's you can like many things,
right?And then you upgrade and get the
paid version, which is probably more
suitable for people with like very
chronic conditions. So that's how it
works today, right. So like you just go
on enroll or whatever that process is.
Like what can you talk just a little bit
(42:46):
about that too?Yeah, so
we can, well, you can find us
on. App Store, Google Play
Store. You can find us online. One thing
that was really important for the
co-founders was that we were accessible
on pretty much any device. So you can use
us on a tablet. You can use us on a
phone, on a computer. We're
(43:08):
web-based, so you don't have to have the
app. Like I can go on guavahealth.com and
sign in and be on my laptop and it worked
just as well. And then the other thing
that... we're doing a little bit more of
is partnering with providers and really
what that looks like. It's It's pretty
much the same experience from the patient
perspective. It's just navigating or
(43:29):
finding out about us through providers
and making it so the provider has an
easier time getting the information that
is most relevant for you and your care,
because something, and feel free to cut
this out, but something that was really
interesting learning from Kat is that
When you are a hospitalist or or someone
just working in a hospital setting, you
(43:50):
are manually scrolling through pages and
pages and pages worth of data to find a
needle in a haystack, and you already
know the needle. And it takes hours
of your day every day to search for that
needle for a single patient. And so with
Glava, you can literally just type into
the search bar of that particular
patient's profile and find
(44:11):
exactly what you're looking for
Immediately. And so that's something that
we want to work more with providers with
because we're making their life easier to
make the patient's life easier. So first
and foremost, app stores, website, social
media, and then secondary to that would
be through providers. It's like sticking
a big old magnet in the haystack and
(44:33):
pulling out the needle like that. Yeah.
Oh my God, that's a perfect analogy.
Yeah. She's like, I'm going to use that.
You're the magnet in the haystack pulling
out the needle. Yeah, free to use it.
Yes, you can have that one. No copyright
issues on that, Jeremy. No, I I
I give those away. You know, it's
amazing. It's like you went into this or,
(44:53):
you know, obviously you're you're part of
this, you know, the founders saying we
want, we want to help the patients, right?
We want to help the people. And it's
becoming this tool to really
help the providers too. So
I mean that's it's pretty amazing. and
what's more important than the patient
provider relationship in healthcare. So.
(45:16):
Yeah, I agree. Yep. They doctors
can doctor more. Exactly. And, And I
think for so many patients too, because
they have had bad
experiences, they then don't trust their
providers, even if it's a different
provider at a different hospital system,
or they feel like all providers are not
going to listen to them. And from my
(45:37):
perspective, like if you're a doctor,
By and large, you're not in it for the
sole purpose of making money, right?Like
there are so many other ways to make a
lot of money that doesn't require
so many years of school and so many.
long, long days and long hours. And so
you're in it because you do wanna help
people. And it really is just
(46:00):
trying to find a way for them to doctor,
allowing doctors to doctor and allowing
them to actually spend time with the
patient and listen to them and and make
them feel heard and solving their
problems and how they were trained. Like
they didn't go in it to chart, they went
in it to help people. Yeah,
this is a game changer. Yeah. And it it
(46:20):
builds confidence for the patient too.
Like people walking in not knowing how to
say what they want to say, you know, it
makes it very difficult. But with that,
you know, like your your your visit prep
there, you were talking about that it
actually gives them, you know, the the
vocabulary gives them the specific
way to present what they want to say that
they walk in there with confidence and
(46:41):
say, doctor, this is what's wrong with
me. This is why I know that. Yeah,
I mean it just it it makes it so such an
easier streamlined process for everyone
involved. It seems like it's what a great
idea. Yeah, this is exciting.
It's so it's so funny because the white
coat syndrome is so real and so
you I personally get severe anxiety
(47:03):
going to a doctor and I will have
scheduled an appointment because
something is wrong and I will spend.
19 of my 20 minutes being like, oh, I'm
fine. Like, I don't even know why I made
this appointment. Like my symptoms aren't
that bad. And then as they're walking out
the door, it's like, by the way, I have
this one little thing that like could be
problematic, but I'm sure it's fine. And
the provider's like, OK, well, I have no
(47:25):
more time with you today, so you're going
to have to schedule a follow-up.
And that happens to so many people. And
And so this idea of one.
feeling more confident because you have
the data on hand. And two, if you're
worried about a provider not believing
you, it's not you saying these things
from your memory. It's a piece of paper
(47:45):
with data that exists. And it's like,
here, here is the data. You have to take
me seriously because it's not just me
saying this. It is this other third
party app that is saying this. And I, and
I think that that also is really
validating for people too, because it's
like,You know, if you're if you're trying
to remember what you ate for lunch today,
or if you're trying to remember how many
(48:06):
headaches you've had in the past week,
that is it. We're fallible. We're human.
We don't have a great memory as it
stands. And so having this piece of paper
where it's like, oh, I can actually say
definitively how many headaches I did
have. And if I'm tracking what I ate for
lunch, it's also data that exists too.
So
amazing. Well. I don't know about you,
(48:28):
Jeremy, but I'm like a little bit
mind-blown right now. And I
I just, I'm like over, I'm
like overwhelmed by what this app is
capable of doing and how it can literally
change people's lives. And just the fact
you can go from doctor to doctor and
actually have all your information
available. Like, I I don't know anything
(48:48):
about healthcare. And even I know that's
been a long-standing issue for people,
especially for people with chronic
problems who have to go to a lot of
different doctors. And that what an
amazing advancement that can be. Yeah, it
really is. So, wow, I've learned a lot
today. This has been exciting.
So let's wrap this up on a high
note, cause I'm like excited to literally
(49:11):
tell everybody I know about this Guava
Health app. Just
PS. I hope to get you some new
members or enrollees or clients or
whatever term it is that you use. I'm
going to check it out and I didn't even
go to the doctor. Nice. Yeah,
exactly. But yeah, I'm excited to share
with everybody about this. But
(49:33):
can you share before we before we say
goodbye to you, where can we find you
online social media?You've you've touched
on a few things already, but if you can
kind of summarize that up here so
everyone knows where to find you all and.
and get get engaged with
Guava. Yeah, so you can find
us online at guavahealth.com and then you
(49:54):
can find us on social media, both TikTok
and Instagram, Guava Health and Guava
Health Inc, depending on whether you're
on TikTok or Instagram. But if you search
Guava Health, we should be the first ones
to pop up. Awesome. Nice, you
got your good SEO too, that's that's
smart, that's smart. Yeah.
Easy to find is good. Always an easy to
(50:14):
find and you're you're you're active out
there. So go follow Guava
Health if you're interested in learning
more about Guava Health and and get
enrolled in that app if particularly if
you're listening and you have any kind of
chronic health conditions. And if you
have to see a bunch of different doctors
in succession, yeah, there you go. It's a
perfect place to be. Well, Isabel, thank
(50:36):
you so much. This has been absolutely.
like overwhelmingly exciting. I
literally cannot wait to like shout this
from the mountaintops, what you guys are
doing. So we really appreciate you coming
on and talking with us today. Yeah,
thank you so much for having me.
(51:00):
And there you have it, our interview with
Isabel from Guava Health.
Cool stuff. What a what a great platform
they're building there, bringing
everything together in one place like
that. But what are our main takeaways
here, Heather?I think
really the biggest one is that the
episode and just, you know, hearing from
Isabel and what they're doing there at
(51:20):
Guava is getting a full
understanding one of the capabilities
that they have and the solution
that it is basically
providing. to a lot of big issues in the
healthcare industry. The
GuavaHealth app really just, it it
gives people um
(51:41):
what we've all been, I think probably
wanting for a long time, you know
that access to information, that kind of
you know bringing together of of
disparate data, you know and that seems
to be like a trend I think too. It's kind
of a common thing that comes up in inA
lot of the interviews that we've been
having and putting yourself in control
(52:03):
of of your medical information and
being able to control its flow and
control where it goes, who sees it,
things like that. Like before
this, like anyone not on that
platform as far as I know, like we've
heard from people that they're getting
like there's diagnosis in their charts
that they were never even told about.
(52:25):
That's crazy. It's pretty mind-blowing.
And you know, particularly, you know, the
Guava app is definitely geared for people
with, you know, complex, complicated
health conditions, you know,
comorbidities, things like that. You
know, lots of doctors, lots of, you know,
medications, lots of therapies, et
cetera. So, you know, to have so many of
(52:46):
so many things, you know, that they need
to be thinking about to bring it
together in one place. Is it's a
game changer. Yeah, really is
brilliant stuff. Very glad we we were
able to get them on here in the earlier
days. Maybe check back in with them in a
while, see how it's going. Yeah, might be
worth the return trip the year from now,
(53:06):
but yeah, that's just me daydreaming.
But all right, I guess that wraps it up
for today. Before you go, please take a
second to hit all those happy little fun
buttons, whatever platform you're on, the
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(53:28):
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(53:49):
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Blue Sky. Just search Healthcare
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Additionally, if you are a
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(54:09):
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(54:31):
Also give us a shout there at the e-mail
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As always, keep looking for the good in
the world, because sometimes it's where
you least expect it.
(55:44):
This has been a shut up production.
This is Healthcare Uprising.
We are here to shine a light on the
innovators implementing positive change
in American healthcare and the
patient experience stories, good and bad,
that can help others navigate the
sometimes overwhelmingly complex
American healthcare system.
(00:43):
Welcome to the uprising.
We are not doctors and we don't play one
on TV. If you need medical advice,
consult with your physician or a
healthcare professional.
(01:04):
All right. Hello, health
heads. Welcome and thank you for checking
in to this dose of the healthcare
uprising. I'm your producer in the back,
Jeremy Carr, here with your host in the
front row, Heather Pierce. So what is
on our agenda for today, Heather?This
week I'm super excited to chat with
Isabel Stewart. She's the head of product
for Guava Health and also a founding team
(01:26):
member of Guava Health. Guava is
dedicated to building tools that empower
people to take control of their health. A
graduate of the University of Vermont
with a degree in molecular genetics,
Isabel spent time in wet labs at the
University of Vermont, as well as the
Jackson Laboratory in. Bahaba
Maine Bahaba. How'd I do?You said that
(01:48):
pretty well. Thank you. I could tell
you're not native, but better than most
would do with it with the Bahaba.
So Isabel then joined Amazon Alexa,
where she worked on the health vertical
as a knowledge engineer, working with
large data sets to deliver answers to
critical health questions, from
medication side effects to pandemic
(02:08):
updates. I realized as soon as I said
Amazon Alexa that I looked around to make
sure I didn't have one of my. Alexa's in
here because she might have asked us a
question. Yeah, yeah, there you
go. During COVID-19,
Isabelle spearheaded Alexa's
information response, ensuring users
globally had timely and accurate
(02:29):
information about symptoms, local case
counts, and more. So this is one of the
people behind Alexa. Yeah. Oh, that's
wild. Yeah, really cool. So at Guava
Health, Isabelle combines her passion for
health and technology, working closely
with end users who are patients. To
create solutions that improve health
management and quality of life. So
another total rock star on our show
(02:50):
again. So let's go one genius after
another on here. Yep, pretty much. It's
like a Mensa convention in here.
I don't know what I'm doing here. I just
have. I just own some microphones. Yeah,
that's basically it.
All right. Well, without further ado,
let's get into it. Here is Isabel from
Guava.
(03:16):
Hi, Isabel. Thanks and welcome to
Healthcare Uprising Podcast. We're
excited to have you on the show today.
I'm excited to be here. Thank you. Great.
Well, let's jump right into it and tell
us a little bit about your background,
your experience, what drove you to join
and help build Guava Health and
and really kind of what your story is and
(03:38):
and and what you're here to do. Sure.
I'm Isabel. I'm head of product at Guava.
My background is actually in molecular
genetics and microbiology. And I
spent a lot of time in wet lab research,
which is hanging out with mice a lot of
the time. And after a little while, I
realized that I enjoyed human interaction
(03:59):
a little bit too much to make a career
out of that. So I switched over to
tech and engineering world. I joined
Amazon. right after college
and the pandemic hit. And because of
my background in health, prior to that, I
was on the health vertical for Amazon
Alexa. So during the
(04:20):
pandemic, I ended up running a
lot of Alexa's responses. So I worked
with Reuters, I worked with AP, I worked
with Hopkins to deliver
as up-to-date information as possible on
the pandemic. And that was a really
eye-opening experience and kind of got me
moreinundated into the health
ecosystem. And after that
(04:41):
phase of my career past, I ended up
connecting with the co-founders of Guava
who had also worked with me at Amazon.
And they told me about this really cool
project and startup that they were
working on. I was like, oh my gosh, how
do I join?You are working on this really
amazing thing that can help so many
people. Um And you guys have
such a great tech background and I would
(05:02):
love to be a part of it in any way that
That looks like. So that's kind of how I
ended up joining Guava. And a few months
after that, when I was, it
was early days Guava and I was doing a
lot of early interviews for people's
personal experiences navigating the
healthcare space because really what
Guava was at that point was we were
building a foundation for solving an
(05:24):
information problem. So we were building
out integrations with. The VA or
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, My
Chart, Cerner, Epic, et cetera. And
so one of the people that I chatted with
was someone I had gone to high school
with, Emily, who now works at Guava as
well. And she had posted on social media
about how she had chronic
(05:45):
Lyme and three tick-borne illnesses and
toxic mold poisoning, and how it was
only through the fact that she
had. The accessibility and the
funds to be able to go out of network for
these providers that she was able to get
a diagnosis and that was a really
impactful conversation I would say and
kind of switched my thinking about what
(06:07):
Guava could be. And so we really took
that back to the team and said hey like.
There is this absolute need in this
chronic condition space of people who are
spending 10 years to get a diagnosis and
don't know where all of their records
live. And so let's really try to focus on
solving these really hard problems about
integrating all this information into one
place and see what we can build out to
(06:28):
try to improve the quality of life for
people who have these chronic conditions,
whether they're diagnosed or trying to
get a diagnosis.
Wow. Yeah, sorry, this was a
long, long walk. No, that's that's
amazing. You know, I know a little bit
about Guava, and so
that's a great setup, I think, for kind
(06:49):
of understanding maybe the
impetus behind Guava Health and how it
came to be, and the fact that you are
working in a lab with mice, and then you
end up working in the healthcare vertical
of Amazon Alexa. So like when I ask a
question, hey, as
we like to call Dr. Google, right,
(07:09):
why does, I don't know. Why is my
myWhy do I have a headache when I do
XYZ?Like you're gonna like you were.
That's a really dumb, probably lame
example, but do you come
up with the prom or the responses on that?
Is that what you were doing there?Yeah.
So ohh we worked in structured
(07:30):
data sets for the most part. I was a
knowledge engineer, which means
absolutely nothing to most people. But it
basically means that I dealt with
structured data sets and worked within a
knowledge graph. And so when you asked
Alexa a question like, why do I get
headaches or is a
headache a side effect of Zoloft?
(07:51):
That is something that Alexa
understands as a prompt or a question
where it's like, does X cause Y or
is XA side effect of Y
that gets fed into the system and then I
will have worked something on the back
end or another version of me work
something on the back end to surface the
hopefully correct answer from a reputable
(08:14):
source, because that's really important
because we don't want to be serving
inaccurate information. So,
so you've worked in labs, you did
that. Obviously you're learning a great
deal of knowledge about very clinical
things, I imagine in that.
And then you come to Guava and I want you
to tell us a little bit more about what
actually Guava does, but I do want to
(08:36):
kind of circle back at some point. Oh my
God, I just dropped corporate jargon. I
am going to apologize for that
immediately. There is no place for that
here. Rewind.
Make sure you add in the rewind sound,
Jeremy, on that one. Perfect.
I do want to come back to that though,
because how that has
(08:57):
made you so qualified
and knowledgeable in in kind of,
you know, Guava Health's, you know,
objectives, right?Like the ultimate goal.
Having that kind of knowledge because,
you know, medical conditions are complex.
So let's talk about next. Just tell us
really, what is Guava Health doing?Like
(09:18):
tell us about the app kind of, you know,
the purpose, the goals, everything. Yeah.
So Guava does a lot.
It at its core is solving an information
problem. So in the US at
least all of the different patient
portals that you have. Are likely
completely separate things. So the
(09:38):
information that exists on the patient
portal that you see in hospital A is
completely separate information from what
you see on the patient portal in hospital
B and hospital C and hospital D And
people have this conception in their
head that all of their providers have
access to this information and all they
have to do is look up your name in this
massive database and that database. Does
(10:01):
not exist in the US It should and it
doesn't. There are some countries who are
better at it than we are, but
because of that, it's really up to the
individual patient or person to make
sure that their providers are informed
and have all of this information. And if
you're a really healthy individual, then
it kind of matters a lot less at that
(10:21):
particular moment in time that provider A
and provider B have that same level of
information on you. But if you're trying
to get a diagnosis or if you are
trying multiple different types of meds
that have been prescribed from different
providers, then it matters a lot more.
And so Guava helps you integrate and keep
those integrations live with.
(10:41):
connections to your patient portal at
hospital A and your patient portal at
hospital B and then your fitness devices
and your medical devices like Dexcom and
Libre and allows you to track your
symptoms and set med reminders and track
your cycle and all that information
because you are a whole person. It's not
just the clinical data. It's not just the
(11:02):
fitness data. It's not just the symptoms.
It's like all of this packaged into one
Single singular place. And then with
that you're able to one, understand more
about your own health and then two, help
your providers help you at the end of the
day because they have the information in
a way that they can understand really
quickly as well. And so that's kind of
(11:25):
the core problem I would say that Guava
is solving because we've moved
on a little bit from the foundations and
we're able to kind of. dive a little
bit deeper into what we can do now that
we have this data so we can help you
discover insights like, is air pressure
actually affecting your headaches?Or is
that, I don't know, spaghetti and
(11:47):
meatballs that you eat every Friday
impacting your stomach aches on Saturday
morning?And so we've really kind
of migrated into
more of empowering the individual
to get answers and to understand their
health more.
It seems to be a now recurring
(12:07):
theme on a lot of our subject
matter here that healthcare in America
is is going towards a point where people
have to start figuring it out for
themselves and then let their doctor know
what's wrong. At home
testing. We've done some at home testing
stuff and with these apps that
are tracking things for everybody and
(12:27):
like figuring out their problems. It's
it's almost like a bittersweet thing.
It's very cool that we're starting to
have the technology. It's very Star Trek.
You can hold your doctor in your hand and
and it can tell you what's wrong. But at
the same time, what does it say about our
actual healthcare system and our
interaction with our doctors and the
whole process and you know, the actual
(12:49):
IRL healthcare process?
That's the bitter part, I guess. Yeah,
I I have so many thoughts on our
healthcare system. Yeah,
we do too. Yeah. I mean, you guys are
doing this podcast for a reason. Exactly.
I I think it's both a
(13:10):
wonderful thing that we are giving.
More power to individuals, not just
Guava obviously, but as you mentioned at
home health tests and kits as well.
And there's other services that are that
are really trying to upend the current
status quo to make life better for
individuals. But it is really
frustrating, just all of the red tape and
(13:33):
all of the bureaucracy within the
healthcare system to make change.
And so it's really. We have to
collectively, and I think we're not the
only ones who realize this, like we have
to work from the patient forward rather
than trying the health system first.
Because when it goes into the health
system, they're already inundated with
so many things that they have to do. Like
(13:54):
providers get to spend 12 minutes of
their 30 minute appointment actually
talking with a patient and the rest of it
is charting or making sure that all of
the the notes are sent over for the
referrals or whatever it is. And so it's
been. A really interesting process,
working patient first rather than trying
(14:14):
to change things within the healthcare
ecosystem 1st and hoping that has a
trickle down effect. The system itself, I
mean I've always, you know, and I come
from the the carrier side. Well, I did
anyway. I worked in that space for a long
time and I always described it as it was
like turning the Titanic, right?Like it's
just, it's so big, it's so clunky, it's
so complex. There's a bazillion things
(14:37):
going on, right?So many different things
that are happening that kind of bubble up
to the top there that the patient has
kind of gotten a little bit
forgotten, excuse me, a little bit
forgotten in the process, right. So, but
I love the way that the, the, I love
the way that the industry quote UN quote
(14:57):
is shifting to become more consumer
friendly, which I've never, you know,
I've worked in the healthcare industry
since 2002 and so to see that
change. And to give people power
and empowerment and decision making
around their healthcare is a is a pretty
beautiful thing to see. And
digital technology A I
(15:20):
is is really I think the catalyst for
that. So and people getting sick and
tired quite honestly. Yeah, I think, I
think A I will hopefully be a huge.
Relief for the strains on the
system, because AI can kind of be
the first line of defense for people
trying to find answers. And so they don't
(15:40):
have to go to the Uh or urgent care or
try to schedule an appointment that will
cost them $60.00 a $100 for
5 minutes of a provider's time and
instead can utilize AI to get
some. answers, and then they can take
that initial research to talk with a
person. I don't think we'll ever lose
that human connectedness within the
(16:01):
provider ecosystem, but I do think that
there is so much good that AI can do.
And it's been really fascinating kind of
looking at the different perspectives,
whether you're on the patient side and
what AI means for you versus if you're on
the provider side or the administration
side, and what AI means for them
and what AI means in like a hospital
(16:21):
setting. So it's a really exciting time
and and I'm really excited to see what
the world looks like, honestly, in a
year from now or two years from now.
Yeah, me too. It is. I tell
everybody to work in healthcare right now
is maybe the most exciting time that at
least I can remember. Again, I've been
(16:41):
I've been around the block for a while,
but I love being a part of it so much
that I don't I don't want to leave
because we're part of the we're part of
the uprising. Yeah. I mean, we are.
That's what this podcast is about is talk
with folks like you and what you're
doing. And and
Jeremy, did you have a question?I'll let
you plug. Actually, I I just wanted to
(17:02):
say as someone who's not in the
healthcare industry, I am
glad to hear this much positivity coming
from two people who are right now, at
least in this capacity and
the fact that this, this technology is
going to give people the ability to kind
of take control of their own healthcare
and understand their own health. In a way
that we've never been able to do before
(17:24):
that that is pretty exciting. It's
exciting. So
let's talk a little bit more about Guava
Health too in terms of what, you know,
this app, you know, and the capabilities
that it has, which is really pulling
together a lot of a lot of
information in somebody's medical record
into one place, right. And then kind of
(17:45):
seeing some cause and effect things,
right. Like if I do this, this is. I'm
seeing my blood pressure go up if, you
know, they're tracking that way. Are
there certain people or people with
certain types of illnesses or conditions
that the app is really well suited
for?You know, does it make sense?
Does it make sense for somebody who's
really well to use it?I mean, maybe it's
(18:06):
more of like preventive care, right?So I
guess, I don't know, let's maybe talk
through that a little bit. Yeah. So Guava
is. ideally built for everyone. Um
My parents who are in their 70s use it.
I definitely will help them here with
like what button to press, but but
they're they're capable and competent
(18:27):
enough to be able to to navigate the app
pretty much on their own. And then we
also have functionality and features for
new parents for their kids. And so it
really is a a whole family
experience. I would say
thatFor right now,
the people who find the most value, it
seems like just based on people reaching
out to us, are people who are navigating
(18:49):
the healthcare system a lot. And that
usually means that they have more than
one chronic condition and they're seeing
51015. 30 different
providers within a six month period or a
year period. And so they have a lot of
information that is really challenging
for them to keep track of and they have
all these symptoms that they're
experiencing. And when you're sitting in
(19:10):
front of a provider and they're doing the
rapid fire questions of how many
headaches have you had this week or
what's the severity or what's the
frequency and you get nervous and you
black out, then you have to kind of
repeat that exact same experience five
times over to finally get an answer. And
so Guava has really. Kind of bridged that
communication gap for a lot of people
where that data just exists and we've put
(19:32):
it into a format that both a user like
you and I can use and also provider can
look at it and immediately understand the
relevant information that can allow them
to give the best care possible. So it is
technically a whole family app,
but in practice it's definitely people
who have chronic condition to have found
(19:52):
the most value out of it. That
makes sense. And I I know you mentioned
my chart, which I think obviously plays a
big role in terms of bringing in medical
records and if someone's seeing 15
doctors, Oh my gosh, that's crazy in one
year. It's like mind-blowing. I've never
had any like long-term chronic conditions
or anything like that. So I I know people
(20:13):
who have, but can you talk
about?And maybe explain a little bit more
about how Mychart plays into this in
terms of the medical records. So like I
can go into the office and be like, hey,
I've got everything I need to know from
every visit that I have. Like, how does
that work?Yeah. So the way that
Guava works with Mychart
is that Mychart is a patient portal and
(20:34):
Mychart accounts for, I want to say
50 to 60% of patient portals across the
US So they are definitely one of the
biggest, if not the biggest player.
Cerner is another heavy hitter, but.
What that really means is that all of
their the hospitals that use MyChart
all still have separate MyCharts and
(20:55):
they've gotten better. And so now they
have, I think it's called Care Everywhere
or the Epic Orchard, and you're able
to, providers are able to see records
from across other MyChart accounts for
you, but they still don't have access to
your information that exists in Cerner or
Hilo or AllScripts or your device data.
(21:16):
AndSo Guava allows for that integration
of not just the MyChart information, but
also all of the other patient portals
that you have and your medical and
fitness devices. Um And
something that we've heard too, that has
actually been really eye-opening because
similar to you, I don't have
15 separate doctors that I see. I have,
(21:37):
I want to say five or six, but
I'm prettyLike, I know kind of what's
wrong with me. And so when I look at my
condition list, I'm like, oh, yeah, this
makes sense. Or my active Med list. I'm
like, oh, yeah, like I'm actively taking
all of those. But when people who have
all of these different providers who
exist in different systems and patient
portals aren't built for the patient,
(21:58):
right?Like they were originally built for
billing and a lot of people don't know
that. And so the actual user experience
for this is really challenging for
patients to navigate. And so they found
that with Guava, the way that we're
structuring the information for them.
They have found conditions that they
didn't even realize they had a diagnosis
for, and it was diagnosed from a
(22:19):
provider that they saw five years ago and
it was a diagnosis they were that they
were actually spending a lot of money to
get a diagnosis for currently.
And that is not an uncommon thing that
people have mentioned or they've talked
about meds that they've tried and they
can't remember the name. And so a
provider will be like, oh, try this. Med
(22:39):
and it's something that they've already
tried before. And so using Guava is
actually a way for that
information to be shared with their
current providers because it exists in a
siloed system that those providers don't
currently have. So hold
on, I don't know if you
saw my face, but it was like, wow, pick
(23:00):
my job off the ground. Legitimately,
people are finding out, yeah, by using
Guava. When medical records are then
loaded into this app and they're reading
them that they were diagnosed with
conditions but not told. Yes, got
it. I've had,
I've had like a couple dozen people reach
(23:20):
out in the past few months. mentioning
kind of in that same vein, like, oh, I've
been trying to get a diagnosis for this
thing and no one believes me. And it it
turns out that it was an actual
diagnosis from a doctor that they had
seen years prior, but that information
didn't exist in the current healthcare
system that they were in because they had
(23:40):
moved. And so- It didn't carry
over essentially?Exactly. Okay. Yeah,
because they existed in different
systems. And so you pretty much kind of
start fresh. Like when you see a new
provider, it's kind of whatever
information you give them in that first
20 to 30 minute appointment, and then
everything moving forward. And it's like
nothing before kind of carries over
(24:01):
unless you tell them. But if you don't
know you have that diagnosis, then it
doesn't exist to that new provider.
This has been one of the big problems in
healthcare, right, is is the information
pathways where like
places don't sharePatient info properly
and different doctors don't know what's
(24:21):
going on with the patient. Sounds like
you guys solved that. You actually found
one spot that can get all the
information together so you can get an
actual clear picture of what's going on
with the patient. Yeah, that's a huge
step forward, isn't it?Like, I know I'm
not the healthcare guy here, but no,
that's a big deal. I mean, that's a big
problem that's been they've been trying
to solve for a long time. It sounds like
(24:42):
you solved it. Yeah. Well, we're
definitely trying our best. A lot of it
still is, is definitely patient driven.
So the hospital institutions right now
can't do it themselves. It still requires
an individual to be like, yeah, I want to
pull my records from patient portal A and
patient portal B and patient portal C,
but once it exists in Guava, it's
(25:02):
continuously updating. And so if you go
see a provider at any of those
institutions, information will
automatically be. Added into the Guava
ecosystem. And if you share that with
your provider, then they will have the
up-to-date information on you, which is
why people who have all these conditions
really love it because it means that they
can spend less time monologuing or trying
(25:22):
to articulate what's going on. And it's
just like, here's the data, here are my
questions and here's what I'm hoping to
get out of this appointment. Can I
ask like what?What are the main
problems?Do you know?I don't know if you
even have stats on this, but like. What
kind of chronic conditions are most
popular, the most popular
users of your app of Guava?
(25:44):
Do you do you have stats on that?Like
what?What elements are the most tracked
or anything like that?Yeah, so
we have a lot of people who have
Ehlers Danlos syndrome.
POTS. And I don't know if you've heard of
these conditions, they're on the yeah,
they're on the more rare side. And they
tend to affect
(26:05):
women between the ages of I want to say
16 and 35, 40.
And I think that kind of just is in line
withWhere
our audience is or our user base
is, it tends to skew female. And I don't
part of that I think is just they see
myself or they see Emily on social media
(26:26):
and they're like, oh, another female. And
I think a larger part of that is that
females tend to have
a lower diagnosis rate and it takes
them longer to get a diagnosis and they
have those more rare or underfunded or
under researched conditions. And so it's
really they. I don't want to call
out providers because I I do truly love
(26:48):
providers and a lot of them do a world of
good. But historically with our user
base, like so many of them have felt
gaslit and so many of them have just been
absolutely ping ponged throughout the
system of like it's probably anxiety or
it's probably in your head or it's
probably your anxiety or your bipolar
disorder that is causing you to think
that you have this physical ailment when
(27:08):
in reality like. both things can be true.
You can have anxiety or another mental
health condition, and you can also have
this other physical condition. And so
that tends to be where our user base
seems to be. It's like younger
females who
need this resource to be taken seriously
(27:29):
when navigating the healthcare space.
So it's almost like
the the rare conditionsYou need it
more because it's so much easier for them
to slip through the cracks. Yeah, is what
I got from that or be misdiagnosed or
underdiagnosed or not diagnosed. Yeah,
(27:51):
I mean, so many people, they'll go
through like 3 or 4 different and I
didn't know that. of the thing. But like
so many people will go through multiple
diagnoses before actually getting to the
diagnosis that is what's causing
their slew of symptoms. And I
kind of had this assumption just based on
my own really lucky care where if a
provider's like, this is what you have,
(28:13):
or this is what I think you have, that's
what I have. um And in reality, that's
not necessarily true. Like people will go
walking around with a diagnosis that to
your point is a misdiagnosis for years,
and it will take them even longer to get
the accurate diagnosis and then get onto
a track of getting a treatment or a
therapy that's actually going to be
effective for them.
(28:36):
And I mean I have to imagine too and and
I'd love to hear kind of the feedback on
this and and also just a quick plug,
we're going to be meeting with Doctor Cat
McGraw from Guava Health, your new chief
medical officer in a separate episode
where we'll get a lot more into the
clinical pieces and you know her
perspective. But I have to imagine
the providers who have the
(28:58):
patients who are using Guava and they're
coming in and they're like, hey, it's
like all right here. They've
got to be grateful, right?Because they're
limited in time, right?It's not, you
know, providers or doctors want a doctor,
right?Most do, right.
And unfortunately, the system itself
has made it more and more harder for
(29:19):
them to do that. And so I have to
imagine, you know, just like the limited
amount of time that they have with their
patients. So I have to imagine that this
app and the information and the
capabilities it has makes. Things
better for them too. Like what kind of
feedback have you gotten on that part?
It's been really interesting. So one of
the first projects that I worked with
(29:41):
with Doctor McGraw, who is
an awesome individual, she's she's great,
was the visit prep experience. And the
reason for that was because
she came from the provider perspective
and I already had a pretty good glean. Of
what was going on or what was wrong from
the patient perspective. And I guess
(30:02):
I can go into a little bit of background
of this, but I had lunch with a
man whose 6 year old daughter had a brain
tumor and he knew that something was
wrong and went to provider after provider
after provider for this six year old. And
all of them were like, oh, it's fine that
she's clumsy. That's a normal 6 year old
behavior. Oh, it's fine that she's
falling down the stairs or that she's
(30:22):
forgetting words like that's. She's six.
It's normal. And it took him
talking to one of her teachers who said,
I exist with five and six-year-olds every
day, all day for the past 15 years. Like
what your child is experiencing, that's
not normal. And so you, when you go to a
provider, you should say these specific
words and tell them that their teacher
(30:45):
noticed something was wrong. And so it
took this third party individualto
basically tell him what to say to a
provider, for a provider to take him
seriously enough to then go get an MRI.
Once they got the MRI, she had a tumor
the size of a clementine. And then it was
like, you know, care kind of just
unraveled from there in a in a good way.
(31:06):
Like he was finally taken seriously,
obviously, but it was immediate. Like she
was helicoptered to
the tier one hospital. But
From that conversation and talking with
Kat, there's clearly a breakdown of
information sharing between the patient,
who thinks that they're doing a really
great job of telling the provider what's
(31:26):
wrong, and the provider is looking for
very specific keywords. They're
looking for things like dull, ache,
burning, radiating when you're trying to
describe your pain. And even though those
are common words in our dictionary, it's
not necessarily a common word for you
to describe how you're feeling. And so
the visit prep was created with that in
(31:48):
mind to bridge that information gap of
like. okay, here's the symptom that
you're experiencing. With these default
adjectives, how would you describe it and
what is the severity?And then if you've
been logging for two weeks worth of
time, you can create a visit prep and
it's delivered in a way that is one to
two pages long, and the providers really
(32:10):
love that because we're not the first
tracking app on the scene, right?Like
there are so many other symptom trackers
out there or med trackers, and for them,
they're overwhelmed with information.
Like they can spend hours
scrolling to find a needle in the
haystack in their MyChart or a
CSV file. Like they don't want to look at
that. And so the visit prep was built
(32:32):
with Dr. McGraw in a way that providers
are like, oh, I can immediately see
what's wrong with you. Like, thank you so
much for giving me exactly what I needed.
And now we can just spend time talking
because this is... It's built in a way
that they are already familiar with from
Med school training and charting. And
so it allows the patient to actually feel
(32:53):
heard and the provider to have the
information that is going to help them
because it's like, OK, the headache is
described as dull and it's the severity
and it's this frequency. And here are the
meds that this person has tried and here
is the relevant active conditions or
active meds that are on their list.
That's great to hear. That's good stuff.
(33:16):
You know, as you were talking, I was
thinking a little bit more too about, and
and you've already shared a little bit, I
think touching on how this app has
made people's lives a little bit more
manageable, particularly those with
chronic conditions. I hadn't thought
about it. You had mentioned, you know,
like a parent managing their kids,
(33:37):
especially when they're younger, you
know, vaccines and all that kind of stuff
or, you know, whatever else is going on.
But in terms of
like, I don't know, outcomes, trends,
like what are you seeing that is exciting
and amazing or even surprising for that
matter for like your users, maybe
(33:57):
that's through member testimonials, maybe
that's just through data that you guys
are collecting. I would say
something that I'm I personally love
seeing is when people are utilizing
the visit prep experience. That's
obviously a feature and functionality
close to my heart, but it's been really
amazing when people will e-mail us
(34:18):
or Instagram DM us or TikTok DM us
and be like, Hey, I used the Visit Prep
experience and for the first time ever, I
actually feel validated by my provider
and not just brushed off or not just
like, oh, you seem like a complicated
case. I'm going to push you off to the
next person. And that has been
amazing to see because it does really
(34:40):
It takes one good conversation with the
provider to completely change the
trajectory of someone's healthcare
experience, right?Like that's all it
takes. And I think that providers kind of
forget that and and they sometimes feel
like they are just another cog in the
machine. And so being able to help
facilitate a good conversation to make
one person's life easier is
(35:01):
really amazing for for me personally,
something that's surprising, I would say.
And we recently launched something called
the Insights Hub. So it's a public page.
You can go check it out, but it's where
people are sharing their statistically
statistically significant correlations
that they discovered through Guava. And
(35:22):
so it's the, you know, higher air
pressure and increased headaches or
eating dairy and stomach aches. And
so it's been really fun to see all of
these different people sharing those
stats and correlations and they can tag.
conditions that they have that they think
might be related. And so I'll go on to
(35:43):
the Ehlers-Danlos page, not the EDS page,
the Ehlers-Danlos page and scroll through
and see what are common correlations that
people are sharing within that group
that seem to be patterns.
And that's really exciting because again,
it's an under research condition. And so
it's really putting power into patients
(36:03):
or consumers or usersTo get
answers or to find answers just through
the power of the population and the power
of the people. That's
amazing. It's like this could potentially
discover the causality of things that
we don't even really know have a direct
cause, like dietarily or
(36:25):
something like like you eat these two
things together, it's going to cause this
problem. This might actually
like discover new things to
avoid and like. Wow. And yeah,
that's kind of mind boggling. Yeah. Can
you repeat where that is, what that is
again, the website or
insights, insights, insights like
(36:46):
insight hub. Gotcha. OK. And
that's is that part of the Guava Health
kind of online ecosystem. So you have to
be a member user of Guava to to access
that. No. So it's actually public.
Oh, it is public. Okay. Yeah. And it's
based on people. It's only what people
have said that they want to share.
So I have correlations that I'm like, eh,
(37:07):
I don't, this doesn't seem like it would
help anyone else. I'm just going to keep
it to myself or I'm not comfortable
sharing it or whatever it is. And then
the I've probably shared 50 or 60
correlations at this point and other
people have done the same. And so it's a
public page and we're organizing it right
now based on conditions. So EDS
(37:28):
or POTS or endometriosis
or PCOS or long covid. And then
people can kind of sift through those
correlations where it's like common
symptoms that people are sharing
or common therapies that people are
trying out and seeing whether or not it
has a positive or negative effect on
their own joint pain. Um And
(37:51):
within the guava ecosystem,Guava will
surface what we think are relevant
correlations to you based on your own
information and based on the conditions
that you have and based on correlations
that you have. And so that is unique to
being a Guava user.
And Guava right now, if we can talk about
(38:12):
kind of how it's, you know,
accessible, is it a pretty much like a
direct to consumerapp at this point?And
is is that the plan to to really just
kind of remain that way?Or is there any
plans to look into like Medicare,
Medicaid, you know, employer benefit
plans, things like that?Yeah, I mean, I
think it'd be awesome to partner with
(38:32):
organizations. For us, something that
is really important to the founding team
as a whole and and just generally
everyone on the team is that we make sure
that our incentives are always aligned
with the end user and the end user is
It's It's people. It is not a
healthcare institution. It's not a
healthcare administrator. It is not a
(38:53):
provider. We would love if as a
secondary consequence of Guava, we do
make the provider's life easier, or we
make it easier to navigate the
healthcare system regardless of who you
are within that system. But it's really
important to us that our business model
aligns with the end user
(39:13):
rather than just a B2B business.
Business exchange. Yeah.
Well, healthcare is human, right?So,
yeah, that's that's what the uprising's
all about, right?That's why we're here.
Bring it to the people, man. Very, very
aligned.
And now the dogs are barking. The dogs
(39:35):
are. I can't hear anything. Oh, good. OK,
just go ahead. I'm just going to keep
going. So. You mentioned the
Insights Hub, obviously making
providers' lives easier is a big goal.
Are there any other like big changes
coming, like in terms of, I don't know,
product changes or anything like that
that you can talk about or that are in
(39:56):
development even?
Umm I would say the Insights Hub is a big
one. I would say in
2025, we
do want tokind of focus on the
provider experience a little bit more.
And that has come because a lot of
the providers that we work with are
(40:17):
patients themselves, because we're in the
rare condition space. So that has kind of
been a happy accident for us,
not so happy, or I guess a coincidence
would be a better word of it than
anything else. And so we
want to make it so that people who
areproviding care and who are
doctors or who are nurses in these more
(40:39):
rare condition spaces have an easier time
getting the information that they need to
deliver care fast. I went to
the Ehlers-Danlos Society
Conference in July, and there
are, I can count on one hand how many EDS
specialists there are in the state of
Wisconsin. And one of them was a speaker
at this conference, and he has a wait
(40:59):
list of four years, um which is insane.
Four years just to see him and and so if
we can help expedite
his efforts and his care by
helping patients come prepared for
everything that he is looking for, then
that would be great. And so that's
something that I'm looking forward to in
2025. We're always looking to improve
(41:22):
the correlations experience, something
that we're actively working on and
have launched but are going to continue
improving is. the Guava Assistant, and
that's kind of where AI
is used within the Guava ecosystem. And
so you can ask questions to the Guava
Assistant around your own health
information. So for me, it's like,
(41:42):
I'll have a headache and I'll ask
it, is there anything in my ActiveMed
list that could possibly be a trigger
for my headaches?
Or how manyback
pain spasms have I had in the past
month?Or what was the last time
that I had my blood pressure read and
(42:03):
what was the number of it?So it's really
getting personalized information,
insights based on your own
information and and what you've put into
the Guava ecosystem. So
today,The Guava app
exists. Anyone can go online, right?
Any of us humans out there
(42:24):
and you know, sign up and and I
understand there's a free version and
then there's you can like many things,
right?And then you upgrade and get the
paid version, which is probably more
suitable for people with like very
chronic conditions. So that's how it
works today, right. So like you just go
on enroll or whatever that process is.
Like what can you talk just a little bit
(42:46):
about that too?Yeah, so
we can, well, you can find us
on. App Store, Google Play
Store. You can find us online. One thing
that was really important for the
co-founders was that we were accessible
on pretty much any device. So you can use
us on a tablet. You can use us on a
phone, on a computer. We're
(43:08):
web-based, so you don't have to have the
app. Like I can go on guavahealth.com and
sign in and be on my laptop and it worked
just as well. And then the other thing
that... we're doing a little bit more of
is partnering with providers and really
what that looks like. It's It's pretty
much the same experience from the patient
perspective. It's just navigating or
(43:29):
finding out about us through providers
and making it so the provider has an
easier time getting the information that
is most relevant for you and your care,
because something, and feel free to cut
this out, but something that was really
interesting learning from Kat is that
When you are a hospitalist or or someone
just working in a hospital setting, you
(43:50):
are manually scrolling through pages and
pages and pages worth of data to find a
needle in a haystack, and you already
know the needle. And it takes hours
of your day every day to search for that
needle for a single patient. And so with
Glava, you can literally just type into
the search bar of that particular
patient's profile and find
(44:11):
exactly what you're looking for
Immediately. And so that's something that
we want to work more with providers with
because we're making their life easier to
make the patient's life easier. So first
and foremost, app stores, website, social
media, and then secondary to that would
be through providers. It's like sticking
a big old magnet in the haystack and
(44:33):
pulling out the needle like that. Yeah.
Oh my God, that's a perfect analogy.
Yeah. She's like, I'm going to use that.
You're the magnet in the haystack pulling
out the needle. Yeah, free to use it.
Yes, you can have that one. No copyright
issues on that, Jeremy. No, I I
I give those away. You know, it's
amazing. It's like you went into this or,
(44:53):
you know, obviously you're you're part of
this, you know, the founders saying we
want, we want to help the patients, right?
We want to help the people. And it's
becoming this tool to really
help the providers too. So
I mean that's it's pretty amazing. and
what's more important than the patient
provider relationship in healthcare. So.
(45:16):
Yeah, I agree. Yep. They doctors
can doctor more. Exactly. And, And I
think for so many patients too, because
they have had bad
experiences, they then don't trust their
providers, even if it's a different
provider at a different hospital system,
or they feel like all providers are not
going to listen to them. And from my
(45:37):
perspective, like if you're a doctor,
By and large, you're not in it for the
sole purpose of making money, right?Like
there are so many other ways to make a
lot of money that doesn't require
so many years of school and so many.
long, long days and long hours. And so
you're in it because you do wanna help
people. And it really is just
(46:00):
trying to find a way for them to doctor,
allowing doctors to doctor and allowing
them to actually spend time with the
patient and listen to them and and make
them feel heard and solving their
problems and how they were trained. Like
they didn't go in it to chart, they went
in it to help people. Yeah,
this is a game changer. Yeah. And it it
(46:20):
builds confidence for the patient too.
Like people walking in not knowing how to
say what they want to say, you know, it
makes it very difficult. But with that,
you know, like your your your visit prep
there, you were talking about that it
actually gives them, you know, the the
vocabulary gives them the specific
way to present what they want to say that
they walk in there with confidence and
(46:41):
say, doctor, this is what's wrong with
me. This is why I know that. Yeah,
I mean it just it it makes it so such an
easier streamlined process for everyone
involved. It seems like it's what a great
idea. Yeah, this is exciting.
It's so it's so funny because the white
coat syndrome is so real and so
you I personally get severe anxiety
(47:03):
going to a doctor and I will have
scheduled an appointment because
something is wrong and I will spend.
19 of my 20 minutes being like, oh, I'm
fine. Like, I don't even know why I made
this appointment. Like my symptoms aren't
that bad. And then as they're walking out
the door, it's like, by the way, I have
this one little thing that like could be
problematic, but I'm sure it's fine. And
the provider's like, OK, well, I have no
(47:25):
more time with you today, so you're going
to have to schedule a follow-up.
And that happens to so many people. And
And so this idea of one.
feeling more confident because you have
the data on hand. And two, if you're
worried about a provider not believing
you, it's not you saying these things
from your memory. It's a piece of paper
(47:45):
with data that exists. And it's like,
here, here is the data. You have to take
me seriously because it's not just me
saying this. It is this other third
party app that is saying this. And I, and
I think that that also is really
validating for people too, because it's
like,You know, if you're if you're trying
to remember what you ate for lunch today,
or if you're trying to remember how many
(48:06):
headaches you've had in the past week,
that is it. We're fallible. We're human.
We don't have a great memory as it
stands. And so having this piece of paper
where it's like, oh, I can actually say
definitively how many headaches I did
have. And if I'm tracking what I ate for
lunch, it's also data that exists too.
So
amazing. Well. I don't know about you,
(48:28):
Jeremy, but I'm like a little bit
mind-blown right now. And I
I just, I'm like over, I'm
like overwhelmed by what this app is
capable of doing and how it can literally
change people's lives. And just the fact
you can go from doctor to doctor and
actually have all your information
available. Like, I I don't know anything
(48:48):
about healthcare. And even I know that's
been a long-standing issue for people,
especially for people with chronic
problems who have to go to a lot of
different doctors. And that what an
amazing advancement that can be. Yeah, it
really is. So, wow, I've learned a lot
today. This has been exciting.
So let's wrap this up on a high
note, cause I'm like excited to literally
(49:11):
tell everybody I know about this Guava
Health app. Just
PS. I hope to get you some new
members or enrollees or clients or
whatever term it is that you use. I'm
going to check it out and I didn't even
go to the doctor. Nice. Yeah,
exactly. But yeah, I'm excited to share
with everybody about this. But
(49:33):
can you share before we before we say
goodbye to you, where can we find you
online social media?You've you've touched
on a few things already, but if you can
kind of summarize that up here so
everyone knows where to find you all and.
and get get engaged with
Guava. Yeah, so you can find
us online at guavahealth.com and then you
(49:54):
can find us on social media, both TikTok
and Instagram, Guava Health and Guava
Health Inc, depending on whether you're
on TikTok or Instagram. But if you search
Guava Health, we should be the first ones
to pop up. Awesome. Nice, you
got your good SEO too, that's that's
smart, that's smart. Yeah.
Easy to find is good. Always an easy to
(50:14):
find and you're you're you're active out
there. So go follow Guava
Health if you're interested in learning
more about Guava Health and and get
enrolled in that app if particularly if
you're listening and you have any kind of
chronic health conditions. And if you
have to see a bunch of different doctors
in succession, yeah, there you go. It's a
perfect place to be. Well, Isabel, thank
(50:36):
you so much. This has been absolutely.
like overwhelmingly exciting. I
literally cannot wait to like shout this
from the mountaintops, what you guys are
doing. So we really appreciate you coming
on and talking with us today. Yeah,
thank you so much for having me.
(51:00):
And there you have it, our interview with
Isabel from Guava Health.
Cool stuff. What a what a great platform
they're building there, bringing
everything together in one place like
that. But what are our main takeaways
here, Heather?I think
really the biggest one is that the
episode and just, you know, hearing from
Isabel and what they're doing there at
(51:20):
Guava is getting a full
understanding one of the capabilities
that they have and the solution
that it is basically
providing. to a lot of big issues in the
healthcare industry. The
GuavaHealth app really just, it it
gives people um
(51:41):
what we've all been, I think probably
wanting for a long time, you know
that access to information, that kind of
you know bringing together of of
disparate data, you know and that seems
to be like a trend I think too. It's kind
of a common thing that comes up in inA
lot of the interviews that we've been
having and putting yourself in control
(52:03):
of of your medical information and
being able to control its flow and
control where it goes, who sees it,
things like that. Like before
this, like anyone not on that
platform as far as I know, like we've
heard from people that they're getting
like there's diagnosis in their charts
that they were never even told about.
(52:25):
That's crazy. It's pretty mind-blowing.
And you know, particularly, you know, the
Guava app is definitely geared for people
with, you know, complex, complicated
health conditions, you know,
comorbidities, things like that. You
know, lots of doctors, lots of, you know,
medications, lots of therapies, et
cetera. So, you know, to have so many of
(52:46):
so many things, you know, that they need
to be thinking about to bring it
together in one place. Is it's a
game changer. Yeah, really is
brilliant stuff. Very glad we we were
able to get them on here in the earlier
days. Maybe check back in with them in a
while, see how it's going. Yeah, might be
worth the return trip the year from now,
(53:06):
but yeah, that's just me daydreaming.
But all right, I guess that wraps it up
for today. Before you go, please take a
second to hit all those happy little fun
buttons, whatever platform you're on, the
likes and subscribes and shares. Auto
download is a very good one for us on the
audio platforms. If you want
are subscribing on the YouTube, if you're
watching the video version you you can
(53:28):
search us real easy on YouTube. Find us
there. We also have a Patreon with video
versions of everything that you can
support the uprising more directly there
at patreon.com/healthcare
Uprising. And where else can they find
us, Heather?You can also find us
online healthcareuprising.com and all the
social media platforms like LinkedIn,
(53:49):
Facebook, Instagram and
Blue Sky. Just search Healthcare
Uprising podcast and you should find us
out there pretty easily.
Additionally, if you are a
co-founder, a founder,
an owner, anyone who's starting some kind
of start-up in the healthcare space,
(54:09):
you are our people. And we are yours.
So we'd love to talk to you and bring you
on the show and hear about what you're
doing. So shoot us an e-mail at
healthcareuprising@gmail.com.
Also, that applies to all of you
humans out there who have your own
personal healthcare journeys and stories
that you maybe want to share with us.
(54:31):
Also give us a shout there at the e-mail
address and and get in touch. You can
also message us through any of the social
media platforms too, if that's easier.
As always, keep looking for the good in
the world, because sometimes it's where
you least expect it.
(55:44):
This has been a shut up production.
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