Thesis

There are a lot of issues with medication consumption, especially with regard to pain medication. In many cases, the doctor prescribes medication but there is no way to track what the patient is actually doing, or for the patient to get quick answers if the doses and meds prescribed aren’t working appropriately. 

The idea was to create an interface with the doctor – via web or app – to track patient behavior but also allow for quick response when needed. The idea came from the head of Orthopedics at Barzilai Hospital, for whom this was a passion project. He had already made a lot of progress in a first round of work, with a HIPPA-compliant product and approvals to start clinical trials at Barzilai and another Israeli hospital. 

In this phase the idea was to measure patient behavior in a hospital setting before moving to the home environment. The focus was on people post surgery who would get a quick response from their surgeon – via an app or web interface. The patient would ask if they can take more meds, and the doctor would give a quick answer. We found that people were compliant if they got an answer from their surgeon.

Roadmap: 

• Move from orthopedics to other areas, like oncology.
• Make the advice more automated. 
• Add a hardware component to take patient vitals 

We started talking to angels and VCs, but didn’t start an official raise.

Validation

• Clinical trial at Barzilai. We gave patients instructions and then had them interact with us via the beta app. We could see if they went into the app, made requests etc. 

• Conversations with Pharma and Insurance companies, mostly via cold outreach. 

• Spoke to other companies in the ecosystem. 

• Spoke to VCs

Why the idea didn’t progress 

The main complexity was in the move to the US market. 

• You need pharma or insurance companies on your side. Insurance companies weren’t interested, since they aren’t to blame if there is an issue with medication consumption, including addiction. There was no business case for them.  

• Pharma companies weren’t interested since a change in prescription could also be a reduction in meds or a shift to another medication, both of which would result in a loss for them. 

• It was hard to find a hospital in the US that wanted to take part in an experiment. 

• At the end, the project came from a doctor, for whom it was a real pain point/passion project. For us, the very long implementation time frames while still not being able to prove a business-fit was not enough to keep pushing

• We tried to do a few pivots, but didn’t make it. 

Insights

1. If you want to sell a medical product in the U.S., your experience in Israel is of very limited value. All it validated was a psychological willingness of people to use this kind of system, but didn’t have value for the U.S. market beyond that. The clinical trial we ran in Israel was at best an entry point for a clinical trial in the U.S. 

2. In retrospect, I would have flown to the U.S., created meetings, maybe focused more on government (medicare), where there might have been more need/openness. 

3. We could have better understood the medical ecosystem in the US. We were excited that we had identified a problem, had a product, and found product-market fit. But we needed a more blunt read of reality – that you need a pharma or insurance champion. 

4. What we did well: the connection with the orthopedist was amazing, since it wasn’t just two young entrepreneurs. We had a leading expert with knowledge and connections. 

5. The idea is now back ‘on the shelf’ at Barzilai. For Dr. Lubovsky it’s a life mission, so if anyone wants to try and take this on, that would be amazing.

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