The Health Entrepreneurship (HENT) Challenge’s first cohort is getting ready for their upcoming visit to Toronto, where they will continue their implementation phase through activities targeting business development, expanding entrepreneurial networks and facilitating exposure to potential investors.
In the meantime, the HENT Communications team caught up with the ventures from the first HENT Challenge cohort to learn more about the origins of their companies, what they’ve learned to date, and what is coming up next…
Through their work as medical radiographers, Innocent Menyo and his fellow co-founder Ggayi Noah Ronald had seen the plight of many patients with end-stage kidney disease, which resulted from unknown and uncontrolled hypertension. Knowing that the leading risk factor of cardiovascular disease and associated complications is high blood pressure, Innocent was inspired to develop iWell Bio Tracker, a wearable wristwatch that had the capabilities to remotely measure blood pressure of patients.
iWell Bio Tracker’s goal is to replace traditional means of measuring blood pressure, which often require patients to be physically present in a health facility, often having to wait in long queues before receiving a quick checkup. Their solution will allow patients to ongoingly monitor their blood pressure in their daily lives, simply through wearing a watch. Through generated reports, healthcare providers have access to robust and accurate data to provide patients the care and interventions they need to optimize their health.
What is the accomplishment to date that your team is most proud of?
Since iWell Bio Tracker’s launch, the venture is most proud of creating a functional Minimum Viable Product (MVP). Using this MVP, the team carried out a pre-pilot study at Kisugu Health Centre III in Kampala, Uganda in collaboration with technical experts from the hospital.
If you could give advice to another founder getting started, what would that be?
“Focus on having a prototype.”
Looking forward, the iWell Bio Tracker team is raising funds to carry-out a clinical trial on their devices. They are working to acquire a certificate of compliance and commercial license prior to launching their product into the market.
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