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Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

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Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#21

Post by ndamiano »

cmikec wrote: post #9
dr_ wrote: post #6

I don't know what the business plan here will ultimately be, but there are apps which charge say $40 for a dermatologist to read a photo of your skin lesion. As a physician, at first I thought, what dermatologist would accept $40 (or less if the app gets a cut) to do this. But it's making more sense with time. I can see physicians doing work like this from the comfort of their home environments, on somewhat of their…

Thanks for your kind comments. :) You're totally right. We believe this is the correct paradigm for the future of medicine. Going to the doctor's office is no fun, and nobody likes to do it. As a result, many preventable causes of death and illness remain untreated. Bettir's goal is to make it possible to manage certain conditions, like high blood pressure, from the comfort of one's home.

Congrats, guys. What is the business model for Bettir? Is it going to be a challenge to cover costs if you're employing expensive physicians to man the chat lines?

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#22

Post by OmarIsmail »

cmikec wrote: post #14
OmarIsmail wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any visibility as to if/when a device like a fitbit will be able to do blood pressure readings? I feel like if that can happen, when it eventually comes out, every single person will own it. Hopefully it's possible.

There are some interesting blood pressure monitors in the works. I know some internal information from several companies who are working on this that I am unable to disclose at this time. There will be more streamlined, wearable blood pressure devices in the near future. Before then, it's important to note that current home blood pressure monitoring technology is actually pretty good. There are wrist-based monitors a…

Yup, I own one of those and it is a literal life saver.

That's why I want there to be a wearable version. Heart Rate and Temperature should already be measurable on a wearable. Getting BP measurable would give us 90% of the "vitals" information we need to know how we're doing.

BP is the big one too because you can have high blood pressure and not even know it. My wife had gestational hypertension (high BP caused by pregnancy) and her BP went sky high and the whole time she felt fine.

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#23

Post by tomjen3 »

cmikec wrote: post #9
dr_ wrote: post #6

I don't know what the business plan here will ultimately be, but there are apps which charge say $40 for a dermatologist to read a photo of your skin lesion. As a physician, at first I thought, what dermatologist would accept $40 (or less if the app gets a cut) to do this. But it's making more sense with time. I can see physicians doing work like this from the comfort of their home environments, on somewhat of their…

Thanks for your kind comments. :) You're totally right. We believe this is the correct paradigm for the future of medicine. Going to the doctor's office is no fun, and nobody likes to do it. As a result, many preventable causes of death and illness remain untreated. Bettir's goal is to make it possible to manage certain conditions, like high blood pressure, from the comfort of one's home.

I don't much care to admit it, but I have an irrational fear of doctors. This would be a great help for me.

Even better, if you enable people all over the world tohave access to the best doctors.

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#24

Post by discardorama »

FTA: "at certain times by monitoring it 24/7 with an app"

How can the app do this without a BP device constantly attached to one's arm, inflating/deflating all the time? Or is it just a spreadsheet for entering the values? The article was skimpy on the details.

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#25

Post by cmikec »

discardorama wrote: post #24

FTA: "at certain times by monitoring it 24/7 with an app" How can the app do this without a BP device constantly attached to one's arm, inflating/deflating all the time? Or is it just a spreadsheet for entering the values? The article was skimpy on the details.

Good question. There are ambulatory blood pressure monitoring devices, but much more common are devices that take discrete readings. At Bettir, we factor in all data points.

Ambulatory is not necessary in many cases though, where a simple daily reading still provides vastly more information than the once or twice a year that most people go to their doctor.

Most of our users record 1-3 readings per day, which provides a wealth of useful data.

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#26

Post by cmikec »

tomjen3 wrote: post #23
cmikec wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for your kind comments. :) You're totally right. We believe this is the correct paradigm for the future of medicine. Going to the doctor's office is no fun, and nobody likes to do it. As a result, many preventable causes of death and illness remain untreated. Bettir's goal is to make it possible to manage certain conditions, like high blood pressure, from the comfort of one's home.

I don't much care to admit it, but I have an irrational fear of doctors. This would be a great help for me. Even better, if you enable people all over the world tohave access to the best doctors.

You would be surprised how many people have an irrational fear of doctors. And that said, even people who aren't fearful generally don't like going. For most, it's just not a pleasant experience.

We'd love to get you signed up, go ahead and email me at mike@bettir.com I can answer any questions that you have.

And you also nailed something on the head that hasn't been addressed much yet in these comments - one of the biggest benefits of what we're doing is that many people around the world don't have access to the best doctors. By giving people care through our service, we're enabling high-quality care in a widespread fashion.

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#27

Post by cmikec »

ndamiano wrote: post #21
cmikec wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for your kind comments. :) You're totally right. We believe this is the correct paradigm for the future of medicine. Going to the doctor's office is no fun, and nobody likes to do it. As a result, many preventable causes of death and illness remain untreated. Bettir's goal is to make it possible to manage certain conditions, like high blood pressure, from the comfort of one's home.

Congrats, guys. What is the business model for Bettir? Is it going to be a challenge to cover costs if you're employing expensive physicians to man the chat lines?

We started out charging people $10/month for our service, and most of our users felt that was a fair price. We are playing with some other options now. In the healthcare industry there are a lot of possible payment models.

We have done a lot of internal calculations to prove that we can make the numbers work, but you are right that covering the costs is a challenge for this type of service. Without revealing too much, I'll say that part of our secret sauce is the way that we provide high-quality feedback at an affordable cost.

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#28

Post by harmegido »

Impossible wrote: post #3
cmikec wrote: post #2

Hi, I'm Mike, one of the founders of Bettir. I'm available to answer questions if you have any.

I'd love to try Bettir, but it's iOS only. I understand that the reasoning for this is probably a combination of standard reasons why startups ship only (or at least initially) on iOS and the usage of HealthKit. Are there plans to ship on Android or any other platform anytime in the near future?

Why do startups start with iOS, considering it's a smaller market? Forgive my ignorance.

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#29

Post by dimitar »

I actually expected some holter monitor integration for this app when reading the headline, but it seems it is a logging tool (still useful).

I'm going to try the Android web app when I go home. I think I actually need this since I do have hypertension.

I'm in my early 20s and I have normal weight and no medical conditions beside this. I consider my self healthy, but I do take some medication to correct it before it causes me any significant damage.

Re: Bettir (YC W15) Wants to Chat with You About Your Blood Pressure

#30

Post by cmikec »

dimitar wrote: post #29

I actually expected some holter monitor integration for this app when reading the headline, but it seems it is a logging tool (still useful). I'm going to try the Android web app when I go home. I think I actually need this since I do have hypertension. I'm in my early 20s and I have normal weight and no medical conditions beside this. I consider my self healthy, but I do take some medication to correct it before it…

Bettir is one part logging tool, and one part a team of algorithms, experts, and doctors that will give you feedback on managing your blood pressure on a regular basis.

We'd be thrilled to have you use our Android web app. Feel free to reach out to me at mike@bettir.com if you have any questions or comments.

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