July 17th - Bounce Health Innovation (Part 1) - Personalized Medicine & Patient Education

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to the Wellness and Healthy Lifestyle show on your VOCM. Now,
here's your host, doctor Mike Wall.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Welcome to the show. I'm your host, doctor Mike Wall.
Today we have the first of a four part series
with our friends at Bounce Health Innovation, which is an
organization here at New flann and Labrador that supports the
efforts of health tech entrepreneurs as they're changing the face
of healthcare for us here at home. Bouncing his team
have helped or are helping over seventy companies here in

(00:34):
the province, ranging from medical genetics to technology and education
tools for patients. This is the first of our four
part series and today we're looking at local advances in
personalized medicine and how health tech is being used to
educate patients even in the most remote areas so they
can still improve their health. Joining me today is Andy Fisher,

(00:55):
the director of Bounce, to give us more background on
the Bounce organization and their guests. Hi. Andy, welcome to
the show. Hey, thanks Mike. Good to be here. Yeah,
it's great. Actually, this is gonna be the first of
a four part series we're doing this year on health
tech here in the province, which is really exploding. You
are the director of Bounce Health Innovation. Maybe you could
tell me a little bit about yourself and the organization.

Speaker 3 (01:19):
Sure, so well, I'm an engineer by Basgrahms, and I
spent a long time teaching at the university and the
engineering faculty. But towards the end of that particular career,
I joined a help tech startup and got really excited
about what's going on in health tech. And since that
time I've joined this initiative called Bounce Health Innovation. So
Bounce Health Innovation is a project of Tech and l
which is an industry association, and the mission of this

(01:42):
is to really accelerate the growth of the health tech sector.
So it's funded by the federal and provincial governments and
that's it. That's the mission is, let's see what we
can do to accelerate the growth of health tech in
New Falanda.

Speaker 2 (01:54):
Yeah, last time we chatted, I couldn't believe how many
different organizations are really up and coming within this. You
guys are really the people that give them their first
shot to be able to grow and innovate and be
really creative around it. How fast is the health tech
sector growing here in New Flannel aboror it is pretty crazy.

Speaker 3 (02:13):
In the short life of Bounce, which is about five
years old, now there's been I think it's close to
seventy companies.

Speaker 2 (02:19):
That we've worked with. Not all of them still exist,
as you would expect the startups, but.

Speaker 3 (02:24):
Typically those individuals continue to pursue health tech once they
get the bug, and so it's great to see.

Speaker 2 (02:30):
So, yeah, there's an awful lot happening and it's a
great time. Well, that's right. And when I was asking
about what companies should we chat to today, you suggested
four separate companies. Maybe you could tell me a little
bit about those organizations and why you think they're so
important that we share their story. Yeah, I mean.

Speaker 3 (02:47):
Really, it's challenging because there are so many people that
are doing so many good things. And when you talk
about health tech, you're combining technology to solve some of
the critical healthcare challenges that we're facing. So any one
of those is a brilliant story, and it depending on
an individual, they'll connect more with the diabetes space or
their chronic heart conditions or whatever.

Speaker 2 (03:06):
So they're all exciting.

Speaker 3 (03:07):
So really it's not which or above all, it's like
which for right now? Right, that's what we're talking about.
You and I chatted a bit as well about kind
of sectors of health tech, what's going on and maybe
ways of categorizing things.

Speaker 2 (03:20):
And I thought there were two things that maybe we
could focus on to begin with.

Speaker 3 (03:22):
And one is really dealing with patients where they are
access to healthcare, which technology enables in a way that
other things didn't. And so health is working with individuals
who are pre diabetic typically or are struggling with their
health and it's really a way of connecting with them
using technology and artificial tellers other ways to help guide

(03:43):
them uniquely with their condition. Breeze Sweet is another one. Again,
typically people that are recovering from a severe pulmonary challenge
and maybe they've been in hospital and they're coming out.
We know that there's pulmonary rehab is a good way
to go, but most people can't access that, and so
resweet is bringing virtual rehab to them. So there's two

(04:05):
that's really talking about how how does access change when
you use technology. And the other thing that's really important
right now is that healthcare is unique to the individual,
so we need highly hyper personalized healthcare. We're all different,
and so anything you read is going to be general
and it's going to be great information, but it's not
going to be specific to you. So then you get
into something like new click, which is looking at the

(04:27):
gut microbiome. It's able to specifically look at your gut
microbiome and help you understand what's going on. It's set
your body. There's tons of more to say about the
microbiot it's really exciting area, but I'll let nikkiy R
Purviy talk about that. And then you get into what
most people think I think is more complex, which is
the genome. And then we get into things like sequence bio.

(04:48):
So that's another one where you can really look at
the genetics of each individual and then what does that
tell us?

Speaker 2 (04:53):
And how does that help us?

Speaker 3 (04:55):
And I'm going to say, how does that help us
help them help themselves? Because I think the future of
healthcare if everyone is taking more responsibility but has more
understanding of their own health situation.

Speaker 2 (05:05):
Oh it's perfect. It's so true too, because technology, for example,
even mean by wearable tech, it allows you to have
insights into your own healthy you never would have had
before if it wasn't for this technology. So I'm really
excited for this series of shows that we're going to
do over the course of the year. We're going to
feature a lot of different companies that are doing different things,
and today's topics are super interesting for anybody looking to
improve their personal health and understand how tech is shaping

(05:27):
things now. If somebody is listening though, and they do
have an idea or they're contemplating running into this health
tech space and starting a company, how do they reach
out to Bounce in your team?

Speaker 3 (05:38):
I mean probably these way just search Bounce out Innovation.
It is Bounce Innovation dot Ca and my email is
a director like Bounce Innovation dot Ca. But there's a
there's this part you can click on the website to
just put in a comment and that'll get to me
and we'll follow up. And it's it's really kind of
a zero barriers to entry thing, like you might not
even know what you want to do. You might have

(05:59):
an idea, or maybe you're fully formed and on the
way and need some help in getting where you need
to go.

Speaker 2 (06:04):
So we help at all stages.

Speaker 3 (06:06):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
And there are many other great parts.

Speaker 3 (06:07):
Of the ecosystem to help companies, but we're specifically focused
on Heldeck.

Speaker 2 (06:12):
Well, that's fantastic, and thank you so much for organizing
all this and getting me connected with all these different organizations.
We got a lot of conversations to have today, so
I'm going to let you go and we're going to
check in with the folks here at New Click Perfect.
Thanks very much, great talking with you. Hi doctor Gindella,
Hi doctor Paliger. Welcome back to the show.

Speaker 3 (06:34):
H'm Mike.

Speaker 4 (06:35):
It's always going to do there.

Speaker 2 (06:37):
Yeah, that's right. I mean we know each other so long.
Now it's Nicki and Purvi. However, you guys are VHD
researchers and you do run a company called Nuclick Biologics.
Maybe you guys can give me a little bit of
a background in yourselves for our listening audience.

Speaker 4 (06:51):
Yeah, so I'm Nick taking Dyella. I did my PhD
in biochemistry here at one. I originally come.

Speaker 5 (06:59):
From India, so now I'm the new Poland and my
bone sets over in tak Now and living there. So
after our PhD in me and Flora, we started New
Plate now serving towards how microbiol can help the cut helds.

Speaker 3 (07:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (07:15):
Yeah, I'm to the and I finished my PhD two here.
I can't can I agree like thirteen years and as
I said, like we finally finding now home. Yeah, but
the KMES batchally as now we have two kids and
the finally and the company on in sand outs.

Speaker 2 (07:31):
Yeah, I love that. I love that. Yes, it's fantastic
and I love hearing the story of you guys starting
this organization. It's such an interesting thing because you're blending
your academic backgrounds. You're looking at a major health risk,
which is gut microbiome. So before we get into specifically
what your technology does, why don't you guys explain to
me why the microbiome that lives inside of our gut

(07:52):
is so important.

Speaker 4 (07:53):
So, in terms of microbiome, it is important. Why it
is important is a question.

Speaker 5 (07:58):
So science, especially in seeing the research evolving over decades
time now and we are seeing that how we can
increment that microorganism sounds into our betterment of human health.
So as the science is saying that there's no human
disease that is not associated with your microbiol, so we

(08:18):
are using that science to understand how we can regulate
our hera.

Speaker 4 (08:22):
So when we say microbiol, it is not just.

Speaker 5 (08:26):
The organisms that infect us but also contributes to your dietegittion,
your immune health education and your vitamin synthesis. So and
also the major guntreine access contributor regulating your mood, energy,
and various other neurodegenerative diseases. So we are only unrevealing

(08:47):
the beauty of this microctism, how they are contributing, and
how we can understand it better to.

Speaker 2 (08:53):
Regulate our health. That's interesting, I think if people do
think about that and think about things that are external
to us, somehow us to get sick, but we forget
that we've got this interplay with these organisms inside of
our body that are so important for so many different things. Now,
I'm sure that being able to measure microbiome isn't completely novel,
But how you guys are doing it on a larger

(09:14):
scale for the population is can you guys explain what
your company actually does.

Speaker 5 (09:20):
So, as you know, we are a microbiome plumb and
we are using this silence, the microbion science to transform
how we manage chronic disease symptoms.

Speaker 4 (09:30):
So our idea is to progress.

Speaker 5 (09:33):
Towards generating the services, the products that helps in revealing
this microbiome.

Speaker 4 (09:39):
Science and how we can manage those symptoms.

Speaker 5 (09:41):
Because now we see one in every four person dialis
with the chronic disease and it's only going to.

Speaker 4 (09:46):
Get worse after a leader funny. And how we are
going to.

Speaker 5 (09:49):
Manage this is a big question and I think we
have to and the science is also working towards how
we can regulate this chronic diseases, and we are using
the precision microbiome science to understand how we can regulated diseases.
So one of the examples that I can give is,
for example, the matter arts writers which is in your joints.

(10:10):
Whether it's very we are are we connected to your
buck it's an interesting connection and you can use the
diet changes which can help you regulate the pain.

Speaker 4 (10:18):
So we are.

Speaker 5 (10:19):
Contributing the services which will help you to understand how
you can manage those pawning diseases.

Speaker 4 (10:25):
And that's where we're using that.

Speaker 6 (10:27):
Yeah, and that's how we launched the product called gut Chair.
It's a first market and MICROBAMA analysis in Canada and
it is the most comprehensive report that the customers get
out of it. So the process involves the collection of
tool sample and the customers send that sample direct back
to our labs and we analyze and we send them
with the comprehensive report, which consists of dissecting their microbio

(10:51):
what is present, how it is impacting their current and.

Speaker 2 (10:54):
Also the future risks associated with that. And not only that, the.

Speaker 6 (10:57):
Main solution part is the personalized food recommendations and robiotic recommendation.
So many people have different misconceptions about probiotics, but without
knowing what they require is then it's an important point
that's really and what is a probiotic that require and
what is the foods that do work cut requires based
upon your debt potential.

Speaker 5 (11:18):
It's important to.

Speaker 2 (11:19):
Bring the balance into the microbiome.

Speaker 6 (11:21):
So maintaining the balance and including the diversity is the
key here and that's where the gout check helps them.

Speaker 5 (11:26):
Tools Dot one.

Speaker 2 (11:27):
Yeah, I think that's a really important point, is that
not all foods, even if they're healthy foods, necessarily work
well for an individual because it relies on this microbiome
inside of a digestive system to be able to break
down these foods. So myself, I've done this test, my
mother has done this test. I'm a big advocate for
week you guys too, And it was really enlightening to
me to think that I've had all these foods on

(11:49):
this list of these are healthy, these are unhealthy, but
certain ones didn't work really for me. It was very
enlightening to learn a little bit more about my body
all these things that I thought I was doing right
that weren't necessarily right for me. But in general, we're
good healthy habits. But I need you to tweak. If
somebody is interested in this, maybe they're dealing with the
chronic condition. Maybe they're looking at just improving their general

(12:09):
health and tweaking their routine a little bit for a
healthy lifestyle. How do they get a hold of you,
guys so they.

Speaker 6 (12:14):
Can reach out to us on website And it's Mike
dut Check dot cae and the product name is called
dut Check and the Nuking Biolitics is a company name.
If you pipe nucleate for the dut Check and Canada,
the first thing that comes is a mind.

Speaker 2 (12:29):
That ching dot CAA perfect that's perfect. Well, guys, I
guess I got a bit of a question, a philosophical
question for you. That is that you, guys, have been
able to apply your science. You're learning that you've been
able to create this organization. It's novel it's new and
it's making a really big impact. What's your advice to
anybody that's listening that might be contemplating taking that leap
into entrepreneurship, in particular in the health tech sector.

Speaker 5 (12:52):
I think being the researchers, we could implement a lot
of our learnings from our PhD, which teaches you a resilience,
witch teaches your pursuance, and which also teaches you to
be patient. I think we just applied that, and also
the analytical thinking of having those hypotheses and the objectives
and solving it. That side of it, we could definitely

(13:15):
apply that.

Speaker 4 (13:15):
So if you have an.

Speaker 7 (13:16):
Idea, I think we just see a goal for it,
and there is definitely in Saint John's a very good
ecosystem that would help you to validate your idea and
how to bring it to life.

Speaker 4 (13:28):
And yeah, I think the key is to start.

Speaker 5 (13:31):
So we would say that's very ambigate and then your background,
technical or whatever, the the knowledge you down would away anyways,
imply that into your journey.

Speaker 6 (13:39):
If anybody thinks of underpreneurships, I would definitely see the
PhDs also will make it great entrepreneurs We have like
that kind of insecure in the feeling or be enough
from the business background and all, but you know, all
the learnings that we do.

Speaker 2 (13:51):
Like mistakes, we do hypothesis, as they ca said, Lens.

Speaker 6 (13:55):
All these things are are required for the enterpreneurship, so
we make the best.

Speaker 2 (14:01):
Now that's fantastic. Well, it's great to see you guys.
It's great to hear you're doing so well. You're progressing
and evolving all the time. I'll be sure to check
in and probably due for another test myself. Thanks so
much for joining me.

Speaker 4 (14:11):
Thank you so much for hinving thus ingens Nipe.

Speaker 2 (14:15):
Today we're learning about the exciting innovations and personalized medicine
and patient education happening through Bounce Health Innovation here in
the province. Welcome back. Today, we're learning about the exciting
innovations and personalized medicine and patient education that are happening

(14:37):
through the Bounce Health Innovation program here in the province.
Let's get back to the interviews with our tech entrepreneurs.
Hi Lynn, Welcome to the show.

Speaker 8 (14:45):
Hi Mike, it's great to be here.

Speaker 4 (14:46):
Thanks for having me.

Speaker 2 (14:47):
It's great to see you and it's great to catch
up on everything you guys have a lot going on
at Sequence Bio. For the folks that are listening on
the radio that may not know much about your organization,
can you tell us a little bit about yourself and
about the company.

Speaker 8 (14:59):
Yeah, sure so, so I am honored to have the
role of CEO Sequence Bio. We are a Newfoundland and
Labrador based biotechnology company connecting genetic research to discover the
true biological causes of disease. We collaborate with the people
and medical professionals of our province to conduct our genetic research,
and we partner with leading farm and biotech to help

(15:20):
accelerate the development of better preventions, treatments, and medicines for
global and medical needs.

Speaker 2 (15:26):
And maybe I can.

Speaker 8 (15:27):
Unpack that a little bit further for you and dig
through a couple of elements of that. So, approximately ninety
percent crazy number of drug candidates fail and therefore can
never help people in need, and drugs with genetic evidence
as part of their development process are choice is likely
to be approved through the regulatory approval process. Sequence bios

(15:50):
mission is to address the major cause of drug development
failure by discovering better drug targets faster through leveraging the
biological impact of our f under population here in Newfoundland
and Labrador.

Speaker 2 (16:03):
Yeah, that's super interesting, and you're totally right. Personalized medicine
and having an approach that really understands the human body
and the individual themselves is so critical. And you said
the founder population, can you put in perspective just how
unique the genetic population is here in Newfoundland and Laborator,
because we're really special compared to most of the world.

Speaker 8 (16:20):
We are absolutely very special and happy to kind of
expand on that a little bit.

Speaker 5 (16:25):
So.

Speaker 8 (16:26):
In the study of population genetics, a founder population, which
I referenced earlier, or founder effect, occurs when a new
population is established from a small number of individuals that
came from a larger population, resulting in a reduction in
genetic diversity or sometimes with called genetic drift compared to
the original population. So if you take that to our situation,

(16:49):
it kind of stems back to those twenty five thousand
or so migrants who came to Newfoundland and Labrador from
southwestern England and Ireland in the late eighteenth and early
nineteenth century. So in that sense, our you know, the
homogeneous nature of our genetic makeup is a great advantage.
This kind of population genetic structure and reduction of genetic

(17:11):
variation has advantages as it makes Newfoundland and Labrador highly
conducive for genetic research and the potential identification and study
of genetic variants that contribute to the risk and severity
of certain diseases. One of my colleagues at prior, colleagues
who I think might have been on your show before,
often use the analogy of you know, genetic research and

(17:32):
drug discovery research being like looking for a needle in
a haystack. And when you're looking and working with a
founder population like Newfoundland and Labrador, you have the benefit
of your signal to noise ratio being much more pronounced.
And so essentially what that translates to is when you're
looking for that needle in the haystack, there's much less

(17:53):
hay and because you have a much greater chance of
finding that needle.

Speaker 2 (17:57):
Yeah, that's a perfect analogy actually, And you know it's
funny because in today, in the world of wellness, people
always have well your behavior, it's your exercise, it's the
foods you eat. Well. We are learning more and more
all the time that the blueprint that makes up our body,
in our genetics, plays a huge role when it comes
to our health. Can you explain like how genetics redisposes
certain populations to different conditions and on a very coals

(18:20):
and notes version.

Speaker 8 (18:21):
Yeah, absolutely, so, I mean, you know, genetic as you
touched on genetic research studies, how individual genes or groups
of genes are involved in health and disease. Understanding those
factors in genetic disorders is so important and learning more
about promoting health and preventing disease. So we all have
that blueprint or dan age in blueprint, and there are
certain elements of that that we can't change, but being

(18:45):
able to understand that blueprint and those genetic factors combined
with focusing on other elements that we can influence. So
your environment, your lifestyle choices, you know, kind of how
you live are critical components in terms of our overall
health and the potential and real world uses of genetics
and healthcare is vast and growing for us. Focusing on

(19:07):
the one part or element of that for our drug
discovery research efforts, leveraging genetic research and our genetic data
is what's incredibly exciting at this you know kind of
point in time.

Speaker 2 (19:19):
Yeah, that's that is important, and I think that. You know,
it's funny because the genetics play such a role when
it comes to health. Because I was Insertinia recently where
there's a blues out and the guy was like, not
to knock the cookbooks that say to eat the food
from this region, but like eating minestroni soup won't make
you live to one hundred and twenty. It's the genetics
of the region that are really making a difference. But
what's interesting is the GENO was just so complicated. How

(19:41):
is using technology and combining it with health sort of
changing the face of healthcare? So that sounds like exactly
what you guys are doing.

Speaker 8 (19:49):
Yeah, a hunderd percent. So I think you hit the
nail on the head. Like our research and what we
focus on is at the very intersection of science and technology.
And you know, you did a great segue there, Mike.
Being able to analyze the DNA sequence of a human
genioal across the cowort or research participants we may have
anywhere from a couple one hundred to few thousand in

(20:11):
our research studies requires extraordinary compute power, incredibly complicated algorithms,
complex models to identify possible novel genetic variations that are
not only associated with certain diseases, but possibly positive diseases,
so that the technology required to support that science is

(20:31):
just incredibly sophisticated and complex. In addition, privacy and security
are rooted in all elements of the design, development, maintenance
of our tech infrastructure. So for us, our science can't
exist without the underpinning technology. But it's an incredibly exciting
time to be in the field. I mean, I think
twenty years ago when some of our peers first started

(20:54):
to look at the founder effect and what that could
mean from a research perspective. At that time, based on
the advances in technology, you know that it wasn't conceivable
to do DNA sequencing in any large volume of data
because it's just so costly. But now advances in technology, etc.
Make that much more attainable. So it's just really exciting

(21:17):
for us right now.

Speaker 2 (21:18):
Yeah, I can only imagine what's going to happen now
with the advent of AI and all these different things
that can help us to be able to analyze so much.
I guess the big question is for people listening like
this is using some of our genetics and studying individuals
in our population, how does this or how does your
work specifically improve the health of Newfoundlanders and labrariants.

Speaker 8 (21:36):
Yeah, you know, Mike, I think about that question in
two parts. Our research can't exist or continue without the
participation of the people of my province. Like that is
at the very core of what we do, both in
terms of our research participants and our collaborations with medical professionals.
Here in the Newfoundland Elaborator. We take the trust that
our research participants and collaborators place in our research very

(21:57):
seriously and are focused on maintaining that trust and being
very transparent. Drug discovery research, like the work a sequenced
bio can take you years, but ultimately, if we are
successful in supporting the development of new treatments and therapies
for certain diseases that may benefit those living with that illness.
Both the Newfoundland and Labrador and other parts of the world,
there's great uncertainty and drug discovery research, but we're committed

(22:20):
to those research efforts. The other way in which I
think about this question is from an economic development perspective.
You know, we're helping to build an innovative life sciences
sector right here in Newfoundland and Labrador. We're building strong
ties of collaboration within the healthcare system and the Royal University,
and we're contributing to significant investments in stand job creation

(22:41):
and job growth. Contributing to a diversified economic growth driver
and sector in our province has an incredibly positive impact
on the lives of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians in addition to
the potential research benefits down the road.

Speaker 2 (22:54):
Yeah, and that's what we're learning over the next four
series episodes of just how big this sector is becoming?
Really interesting? Is I've known you for a long time.
I know that you've come from I always called a
braided river. There's different paths and lives that take us
a certain place. What's your advice to somebody who is
looking at a career and they thinking, okay, maybe health
tech as a place that will fit me.

Speaker 8 (23:14):
Yeah, No, I mean, I think this is an incredibly
exciting time for entrepreneurs in our problems, particularly in the
life sciences and health tech sector. The focus on research
innovation within all facets of the ecosystem, you know, government,
New Fomland, Laborator, Health Services, Memorial University, Genesis, Bounce Innovation, Techanel,
It's just palpable right now. This focus includes you know,

(23:35):
areas such as strategy, policy, development, support, and mentorship.

Speaker 2 (23:39):
And I guess my.

Speaker 8 (23:40):
Advice would probably be twofold for aspiring entrepreneurs, and one
is to continue to challenge and push focus on innovative
approaches to the challenges we do face. Quotes, challenge the
status quo, and lean into your passion and areas of discomfort.
This is where we all learn and grow the most.
And I think also secondly, you know, always be aware

(24:00):
of the need to strive that balance between advancing the
frontiers of knowledge through research and translating that knowledge into
commercially viable products or services. Both are critical to ensuring
that one's innovation can have a broad clinical and economic impact.

Speaker 2 (24:16):
Now it's fantastic. Well, it's great to see you, and
it's great to hear more about the organization. I'm glad
we can share that with everybody because there is so
much exciting stuff happening here in health tech. Glenn, it's
great to see you. Thanks so much for joining me today.

Speaker 8 (24:27):
Thanks so much, Micah, I appreciate the.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
Time today we're learning about the exciting innovations and personalized
medicine and patient education happening through Bounce Health Innovation. Here
in the province. Welcome back. Today we're learning about the
exciting innovations and personalized medicine and patient education that are

(24:51):
happening through the Bounce Health Innovation program here in the province.
Let's get back to the interviews with our tech entrepreneurs.
Hi Rad, Welcome to the show. Oh hey, thanks for
having me. That's great to catch up. I've been keeping
tabs on your organization for quite a while now and
you guys have been growing. But for the people that
are listening that may not be aware of breef Suite,
can you tell me a little bit about your company totally.

Speaker 9 (25:13):
So we started as a as a pure sort of
medical device company, and that device would help patients monitor
their inhalo usage make sure they're taking their inhalo's directly
primarily for the asthma COPD population. And since then we've
kind of evolved as a company to adding in the
services component and wrapping around.

Speaker 2 (25:31):
More of a program around the monitor.

Speaker 9 (25:34):
And so where we are today is we've created a
fully virtual pulmonary rehab program that allows patients to go
through a comprehensive pulmonary rehab program over a twelve week period. Obviously,
we have maintenance beout added well, and then obviously use
sort of the monitoring technologies that we built as a
part of that program.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
So that's a little bit about us that's interesting. And
so you need to think about respiratory or pulmonary for
people listening, you know, pulmonary has to do with the lungs.
What are some of the major condition that you guys
would be helping people navigate.

Speaker 9 (26:03):
Yeah, so naturally we see a lot of COPD, and
obviously there's other conditions that will treat as well, you know,
asthma on more on the severe side. INTERCEMENTO, a lung
disease brought the ectasists even post COVI.

Speaker 2 (26:16):
But actually we see some patients there, so.

Speaker 9 (26:20):
Really kind of anyone who's like clinically indicated to do
this type of a sort of a rehab program, you know,
we'd be open to treating them. And obviously there are
nuances with each of these conditions, but our approach is
obviously very very personalized.

Speaker 2 (26:31):
So we can take on each of those patients in
a unique way. Well, I think that's another thing that's
really interesting is you guys are using data to drive
the progress and be able to rehabilitate people. Why is
that approach so innovative when it comes to managing these conditions,
and how does it actually benefit the patient to be
tracked as they go through the rehabilitation.

Speaker 9 (26:50):
Yeah, I think it's a really really important part, mainly
because any let's say, one size fits all approach, that's
just not the way healthcare works, right, It's you're not
going to get the same benefit of going through just
a generic program that's the same for every individual. Like
every person that we see may have different call morbidities,
they may have different sort of functional impairments that they

(27:12):
may struggle with. There might be different environmental factors in
their living environment and that sort of thing that could
make things challenging. So taking all of those data points
around demographics, around location, around what kind of condition they have,
and using that to say, say, okay, we're going to
give you this program that's really designed for you in
this particular way. We're going to address those functional impairments

(27:33):
that you have in this particular web, right. You know,
I think that's really how you ultimately engage creation to
be beingful.

Speaker 2 (27:40):
So, you know, a good story.

Speaker 9 (27:42):
This is one of the individuals that we worked with
like who's a character before his wife, So Ben transfers
were difficult as a result of COPD exacerbations and pushing
the wheelchair around the house.

Speaker 2 (27:52):
Like it was difficult as a result of that. So,
you know, we.

Speaker 9 (27:56):
Designed his program around those types of strength basedercizes to
simulate a bad transfer. Obviously, cardio exercises to simulate wheelchair
pushing and that sort of thing.

Speaker 2 (28:05):
And ultimately, when he starts going through and doing those.

Speaker 9 (28:08):
Exercises regularly, he starts to see a difference in the
day to day, you know, life that he wants to
be able to contribute to. And ultimately, I think that's
a huge kind of game changer when it comes to ultimately,
you know, designing around the patient is sort of using
data in a mediful way and to deliver a good experience.

Speaker 2 (28:26):
No, I love that. I think that's such an important thing.
Personalized medicine is becoming so important in the advent of
technology that allows big data to be analyzed. These are
all things that are going to change the face of healthcare.
If I was going to walk through it, like you're
going to walk me through how the tech works, specifically,
take me through step by step everything because I've seen
your device. Some of the newer innovations are things that
are novel to me, But walk me through how the

(28:48):
device works, how the tech works, how somebody goes through
your program. Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 9 (28:52):
So right at the start, like primarily if we work
with like pulmonary doctors, so a pulmonary doctor would refer
their pat to us, we essentially you know, reach out
to them and obviously make sure that they want to participate,
whatever insurance coverage, obviously, make sure we have all of
that in place, and then we basically ship everything they
need directly to the individual. So that will include a

(29:15):
blood pressure cop a pull sock simitter obviously are our
you know, bree sweet sensor. If they have sort of
a en and healer that WI will fit that that device,
and essentially then that's kind of the kickstart of the program.
So all of these devices obviously compete data that's fed
into basically our platform. You know, obviously when patients are
going through the program, they're they're meeting with a physical therapist,

(29:37):
they're doing sort of asynchronous things on sort of their
own time, and our platform obviously, you know, sort of
using the device to to make sure you're tracking healer usage,
et cetera. But but again, primarily I think it's it's
really sort of providing them everything they need to do
this rehab program from all not have to worry about
going anywhere and ultimately using all those data points to

(29:59):
actually drive that further. So the device itself, the one
that we've built through the gotten through FTA, et cetera.
It really fits on top of most like meter dos
and healers and will essentially trap, you know, when a
patient is taking their medication. But also how well a
lot of patients with COPD and asthma, other lung conditions,

(30:19):
et cetera, actually don't understand that they're taking their inhaler incorrectly,
resulting in a lot of that medication out actually reaching
their lot. So the device really kind of helps train
a patient on you know, how to do that more effectively,
and again is sort of wrapped around sort of these
services components to the program. That's obviously it's a huge,

(30:40):
huge impact.

Speaker 2 (30:41):
Well that kind of brings you to one of the
big points here, and that is the technology like this
is helping the people that are suffering for these conditions.
It can be debilitating and totally affect the quality of
life and also require a significant amount of medical attention.
What's the benefit to the community when people are leveraging
technology like yourselves, when it comes to the burden of disease.

Speaker 9 (31:00):
Yeah, I feel like we could talk about this for
an hour, and you know, I think we all know
the common issues, like there's not enough primary scare doctors.
There's there's not enough there's not enough any specialists to
be able to treat the amount of patients that can
benefit from this. We've got super long, long way lists,
et cetera. So you know, you using technology to essentially

(31:21):
bring those specialists to the patient at home, or we
use remote monitoring technology to scale the amount of people
that were able to seet over a year or over
a two year period, et cetera, all of these things.
Like I don't think we'll ever I don't think we'll
ever replace doctors obviously through I or anything else that's

(31:42):
going on. But I do think that we can obviously
make you know, their workflows a lot easier and be
able to get patients to personalization that they actually need
as a part of that.

Speaker 2 (31:52):
And I think that's the biggest opportunity in healthcare.

Speaker 9 (31:55):
There are so many examples of you know, very large
companies that have leveraged technology to create like almost superhuman
providers in a way, and I think that that will
continue to be a trend over these next couple of years.
I mean, like even in sort of the structure that
we have, like traditional pulmonary READAB would be anywhere from

(32:15):
two to three sessions per week that's obviously all going
to be in person, whereas we sort of have a
mix of like synchronous session fons like Zoom, whatever the
case may be, and it's basically asynchronous sessions that are
completely on the patient's some time. So a prime example
of how we can increase the number of patients that
we can see by leveraging technologies is sort of delivered.

Speaker 2 (32:36):
A program in compliance because people can do it on
their own time, it can work, especially we think about
rural aspects of their community and things like that. So
those are all really good solutions and that makes perfect sense.
I guess. The other thing is I've been watching your
progress over the last number of years since you guys
first began. It's been a really incredible journey, and you
guys are really hitting your stride now. If there's somebody

(32:57):
listening that's the next generation of tech health entrepreneur. What's
your advice to them and what words of encouragement could
you give them to take that leap like you guys did. Yeah,
it was funny.

Speaker 9 (33:07):
We were at a bounce of that and I was,
you know, meeting with a couple of the I would say,
knew with our entrepreneurs, And I think it's the biggest
thing is like we need more people working on challenging
problems in healthcare. There is such an opportunity to use
technology to actually really really make a difference at like
a provincial, national, international.

Speaker 2 (33:28):
Level to sort of overall patient outcomes.

Speaker 9 (33:31):
And I think the more and more people that are
excited by those challenges and excited to sort of introduce
new technologies and sort of challenge the status quo, I
think that's how we get further ahead. So I would
say working in tech but also working in health tech.
Basically every time we'll have like a team wide meeting,
we'll tell stories about patient journeys and so sort of

(33:53):
how we've sort of improved their lives. And you know,
nothing against any other tech company, but like that level
of sort of patient story is something that's a little
bit unique to health tech where we're actually making a real, real,
strong difference and impact to people's lives. And I think
there's nothing more exciting than that. So on how I
would say, good thing.

Speaker 2 (34:14):
That's fantastic, that's a great message, and it's great to
hear about the organization. It's great to hear how well
you guys are doing and how you're growing and evolving
all the time. Brett, thanks so much for taking the
time today. Yeah, thanks so much for having me. Today,
we're learning about the exciting innovations and personalized medicine and
patient education happening through Bounce Health Innovation here in the province.

Speaker 1 (34:38):
You're listening to what we broadcast of the Wellness and
Healthy Lifestyle Show with doctor Mike Wall. Listen live Thursday
nights at seven pm and Sunday's at four pm.

Speaker 2 (34:50):
Welcome back today, we're learning about the exciting innovations and
personalized medicine and patient education that are happening through the
Bounce Health Innovation program here in the province. Let's get
back to the interviews with our tech entrepreneurs. Hi Mandy,
Welcome to the show. Thanks Mite, It's good to see
you for those folks that have maybe come across you before.

(35:10):
Can you give me a little bit of background in yourself,
y'h sure.

Speaker 10 (35:14):
My name is Meandy Woodland and I'm the founder and
CEO of AMP Health. In terms of background, I started
out in medical research to twenty five plus years ago,
and then took a big pivot into law practice law
for a while, and then took another big pivot into tech.
So now I use all those things together.

Speaker 2 (35:32):
That's fantastic and I guess that's what it is. Life
takes us on a trail and we don't know how
it's going to go, but it goes in the way
that flows the best, and that's led you to a
really exciting new organization. Can you tell me a little
bit about your company, AMP Health?

Speaker 5 (35:44):
Yeah?

Speaker 10 (35:44):
Absolutely, So AMP was founded i would say during mid
pandemic or early stages. It's a real push towards working
on personalized preventative health. So I've been involved in the
diabetes based since ninety two, so aging myself with that
by working with Diabetes Canada as a volunteer National advocate

(36:08):
diabetes educator and always wanted to do something in that space,
and so working with some friends to bring this to life.
So AMP is on a mission to help millions of
people prevent type two diabetes and works on focusing on
personalized behavior change using real time patient data.

Speaker 2 (36:27):
Yeah, that's that's right up. My ally too. My PhD
was a diabetes, I mean, definitely something that we have
to be cognizant of as a population. Maybe you could
just put it in perspective, how big of an issue
diabetes is not only for people here in Newfland, Laborador
where you're looking at obviously a bigger picture here as well.
How big of a challenge is diabetes for us?

Speaker 4 (36:45):
I mean it's massive.

Speaker 10 (36:47):
I think probably ten years ago or so we were
calling it the tsunami of diabetes. But right now one
in three people worldwide are pre diabetics. So were you
pleded triggers higher than normal but not quite high enough
to be diagnosed, And over the course of about ten years,
seventy percent of those people will become type two diabetic.
So it's a massive, massive cost personally individually as well

(37:10):
as to our health system and then the worldwide economy.
It's a massive loss to the.

Speaker 2 (37:16):
Economic systems in many.

Speaker 10 (37:18):
Countries in terms of people not being able to show
up to work, losing people from the economy itself from
disabilities related to type two diabetes.

Speaker 2 (37:27):
Yeah, and I don't think people realize the leading cause
of reputation in the world is actually diabetes. It's not
being at a construction site and using a power tool.
When you think about what you said there, you said
some people are pre diabetic, not diabetic. Your organization is
trying to remedy that. How does your tech work?

Speaker 10 (37:44):
Yeah, So what we do is connect people with a
continuous glucose monitor. So that's a minimally invasive device that
sits on the back of your arm, measures your blank
glycos every five minutes for ten days. You just forget
it's there, and we pull that data and look for
and then work with people in terms of prompting them
on how to keep their blood sugar and range. So

(38:05):
keeping your sugar in range, preventing really big blood sugar
spikes is really what prevents those complications in those issues.

Speaker 2 (38:13):
And we have.

Speaker 10 (38:14):
Taken decades of clinical psychology research where we know what
works in a one on one setting and now bringing
that to scale to help people understand how they're motivated,
how they move, how they eat, and then tying all
that together from a personalized motivation perspective on how we
do behavior change. We all know what we need to eat,

(38:34):
it's fairly common sense for most people, like I need
to eat better, I need to eat well, I need
to eat vegetables and fruit and drink lots of water,
and I need to move. But because we know that
doesn't mean it's easy to do. And so that's where
we come in terms of helping people figure out what
it is that causes them to spike, what it is
that keeps them out of range, and then how to
change that using the least amount of work possible, because

(38:59):
that's how our brains work. We like stacey, we like
things to day the same. So how do we make
people change your behavior and help people change their behavior
without forcing them them to do a really big change
that's really hard and not sustainable.

Speaker 2 (39:12):
Yeah, I think about that all the time. Is that
our healthcare system tends to be a sick care system. Really,
when people get to a certain level, then they start
getting treatment, But you're trying to address the problem before
it becomes a major issue. What's the benefit of addressing
diabetes early on versus addressing it once you're already full
diabetic or sick.

Speaker 4 (39:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 10 (39:32):
I mean it's like with any chronic illness. If we
can address it in advance, we can do one or
two things. One completely prevent you from getting the disease
in the first place, so you stay healthy. Not only
does that make you functional and happy, it also saves
you a lot of money. But the other thing is,
even if you do progress, it will push it off,

(39:55):
so you'll have a lot more healthy years, You'll have
a lot more time before you need medication or other
kinds of intervention. So at an individual level, it saves
you a lot of time, frustration, and dollars. And at
a systems level, it saves our system from having to
manage a more complex condition and enabling people to stay

(40:15):
healthy for longer.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
Yeah, that's right. I've heard lifespan, but people forget about
health span the longer we can keep it. Really, health
health span is a big thing. So here's the thing.
Technology sometimes is seen as something that doesn't allow people
to connect with one another, it keeps us apart. But
in your case, it sounds like it's helping. How does
leveraging technology allow you to do more for more people?

Speaker 3 (40:35):
Yeah?

Speaker 10 (40:36):
Absolutely, so as we know, not to see your.

Speaker 2 (40:38):
New Filina Laborador.

Speaker 10 (40:39):
But in a lot of places we have a real
shortage of primary care, and so the use of technology
enables us to help people who don't necessarily have access
to primary care and those who do. So we talk
to a lot of physicians who wish they had more
time with their diabetic or their pre diabetic patient population.
But in that like Max, you know, five ten, fifteen

(40:59):
minutes going patient to patient, they can't spend a ton
of time during individual hanseling and individual deep dives on
how that person themselves need to help in behavior change.
And so using technology allows us to reach more people,
allows more people to get access to care that wouldn't otherwise.

Speaker 4 (41:19):
So we talk to a lot of places that have big.

Speaker 10 (41:22):
Rural or remote populations that just can't provide that kind
of care at scale, and so that's what technology is
really enabling.

Speaker 1 (41:31):
Yeah, yeah, I.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
Mean think about our doctors are fantastic, but there's only
so much they can know. When you're having a conversation
for a short period of time. I use my technology,
my wearable tech, to see how my sleep is all
the time. It's able to see my heart rate, when
I was at altitude in Bolivia recently. All these different things.
It gives you this level of conscious incompetence or conscious
competence when it comes to learning, which I think is

(41:52):
just so critically important. Is your technology now readily available?
Can people avail of it?

Speaker 3 (41:58):
WI?

Speaker 2 (41:59):
Will they come acros us it somehow? Not yet?

Speaker 10 (42:02):
So we're just launching our first pilots this fall. We're
really excited that our first ones are a Newfoundland and
Labrador and currently in the market for more pilots, particularly
in the US, so we have a waitlist. Folks can
sign up on our website ampouth dot Ca for the waitlist,
but it will be in market in twenty twenty five.

Speaker 2 (42:21):
That's very exciting stuff. I love seeing that. I love
seeing people that are taking challenges we have in the
province at tournament innovative ways to be able to help
people but also create a brand new business. At the
same time, when I think about your path, which has
been a very unique path, it's very inspirational. What advice
would you have to other tech entrepreneurs or people that
are looking at solving problems in particular in this health

(42:43):
tech space.

Speaker 10 (42:44):
The excellent question, I think talk to as many folks
as possible. I think one of the big things is
that people seem to think tech is not for them
for whatever reason. But tech is literally for anybody, no
matter your background. There's space in the tech world for
you in some form or another. The industry itself, like

(43:05):
I just recently completed a course on AI ethics, and
the industry of technology, particularly in the health space, has
a real need for people from all backgrounds, and so
I think there's just going to be more and more
opportunities to participate. Whether you're coming from a clinical background

(43:26):
or you're coming from arts or sciences or sports. There's
a space for everybody, and so I think just making
connections being part of You talked earlier about community, right,
so being part of Bounce reaching out to the existing community.

Speaker 4 (43:40):
It's very welcoming.

Speaker 10 (43:43):
Having worked in a lot of different areas in tech,
one of the beautiful things about health tech, I think.

Speaker 2 (43:48):
Is that because it's really hard.

Speaker 10 (43:51):
Everybody has some sort of intrinsic motivation to make change,
and so everyone's really open and collaborative.

Speaker 2 (43:57):
Yeah, it's fantastic. Not only you try to grow a company,
you're trying to help people in the process. And that's
a really nice mission to have when you're guiding your
company and you're working those long hours. And you know,
that's why I love doing this series of episodes because
it guess it's a chance to celebrate people that are
going that extra while and trying to make a difference.
So I just want to say thank you so much
for joining me today and I look forward to following

(44:19):
up and hearing how the studies progress. Thanks Ray, Thank
you to my guest for joining me today. As you
can see, we have an incredible growing health tech sector
here in the province. By using our challenges to solve problems,
we're not only improving patient care, but we're also fueling
our economy, which is a win win situation for our communities.

(44:39):
I wanted to thank the team of Bounce for coordinating
all of these inspiring entrepreneurs to join us today, and
if you want to learn more about Balance, you can
find them online at Bounce Innovation dot Ca. Well, thanks
for joining me today. I'm your host, doctor Mike Wall.
We'll see you back here in next week for another
episode of The Wall Show on your voc Yeah,