Nell Meosky Luo's guest appearances

Nell Meosky Luo

Angel Invest Boston

The Early Stage Podcast

Best Next Step with Cass McCrory

Tivan Amour

Nicole Antoinette

David Chang

Brad Feld

Jason Calacanis

Jeff Coyle

Catherine White

Phil Gregory

Ilise Benun

Lisa Woodruff

Jessica Reid

Michelle Ward

Jake Shapiro

Carson Tate

Caroline Carter

OwlTail

Nell in her own words: I'm the founder and CEO of Folia Health, where we're harnessing the power of patients and family caregivers to realize the potential of precision care. Prior to joining the crazy world of startups, I worked as a management consultant for organizations in the healthcare, B2B software, and consumer goods sectors, among others.I went to college at Yale, where I focused on public health and biochemistry. My thesis examined how health reimbursement systems and best-practice protocols agree or conflict with demonstrated outcomes to determine treatment for childhood obesity in the US, UK, and Italy.I'm a big public health nerd, excited about the promise that health tech holds for improvement of healthcare outcomes. For more on Nell visit: https://twitter.com/NellMLuohttps://www.linkedin.com/in/nell-meosky-luo-7a551246/https://www.foliahealth.comhttps://www.instagram.com/foliahealth/?hl=enhttps://twitter.com/foliahealth?lang=en

Nell in her own words: I'm the founder and CEO of Folia Health, where we're harnessing the power of patients and family caregivers to realize the potential of precision care. Prior to joining the crazy world of startups, I worked as a management consultant for organizations in the healthcare, B2B software, and consumer goods sectors, among others. I went to college at Yale, where I focused on public health and biochemistry. My thesis examined how health reimbursement systems and best-practice protocols agree or conflict with demonstrated outcomes to determine treatment for childhood obesity in the US, UK, and Italy. I'm a big public health nerd, excited about the promise that health tech holds for improvement of healthcare outcomes. For more on Nell visit: <a href="https://twitter.com/NellMLuo" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"> https://twitter.com/NellMLuo</a><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/nell-meosky-luo-7a551246/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.linkedin.com/in/nell-meosky-luo-7a551246/</a><a href="https://www.foliahealth.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.foliahealth.com</a><a href="https://www.instagram.com/foliahealth/?hl=en" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.instagram.com/foliahealth/?hl=en</a><a href="https://twitter.com/foliahealth?lang=en" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://twitter.com/foliahealth?lang=en</a>

In Business Archive: Life Long Passion, Creating the Solutions the World Needs Today with Nell Meosky Luo

Dan Toffling

Invest Alongside Boston's Leading Angels: Learn More About Our Syndicates Two young founders on a mission to get valuable data about complex illnesses which are not now easily captured. Nell Meosky Luo and Dan Toffling of Folia Health tell the story of how their startup came together and where it’s headed. Highlights include:  Nell Meosky Luo bio. Dan Toffling bio. What Folia Health does. Patients dealing with complex or chronic illnesses possess a wealth of data that is not now transmitted via the five to ten annual interactions a patient has with a physician. Both Nell and Dan have seen the problem in their immediate families. Built an online platform that patients can use to record important information. This information can be used to guide the patient’s clinical care and, in anonymized form, can be valuable research data. Sal notes that the user experience of their platform looks very accessible. Folia has spent a lot of time on getting the right interactions with patients. How Folia Health came about. Nell notice that researchers did not have access to this kind of data that her mom collected on her brother’s condition. This gave her the idea of finding a way to capture that type of data. Existing data on long-term impact of therapies is usually indirect such as insurance claims statistics. Nell worked on the idea for a year then advertised for a co-founder on BostonStartupsGuide.com and connected with Dan Toffling. Sal asks for you to leave a review of the podcast on iTunes. How Folia Health plans to go to market. Company is emerging from exclusive product focus to focusing on going to market as well. Referral by people in the disease communities is one channel, another is working with clinics. Folia is initially concentrating on Cystic Fibrosis which has highly motivated and organized patients and families. Dan uses Folia with his daughter who has Down’s Syndrome. Dan’s daughter is eager to cash in the certificates for Starbuck’s Cake Pops that Folia Health provides to users to increase engagement. As a user, Dan values the “appointment guides” the platform provides to summarize the information recorded and make it usable at a doctor visit. Makes patients the stewards of their own information and provides continuity when a patient changes doctor. Folia is very transparent about use of data collected and gives patients control over their data. Sal talks about startup Healthjump which works with Electronic Health Records. Link to interview of Healthjump founder, Martin Aboitiz: Interview with Healthjump Founder Martin Aboitiz Nell makes the point that EHRs are really about helping providers get paid by insurers and only tangentially about recording information that can be used to treat patients. Folia plans to make money by selling the anonymized data their system collects to stakeholders who need more data about how their products or services perform with patients. These include providers, pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies and academic researchers. Sal brings up his interview with Keith Elliston, founder of Axiomedix in which they discussed the startup combining patient records with their genomic data in an anonymized data base for research (Link to Keith Elliston Episode and Page). Dan Toffling credits users for their help in making Folia Health’s platform user-friendly. Dan got into computer technology because his father was an engineer. He emphasizes the need to acquire technical expertise before trying to do things on your own. The example is given of Bill Gates dropping out of college to start Microsoft kind of obscures the fact that he had been coding since an early age at a time and was a highly-skilled software engineer when he dropped out of Harvard. Another turning point of Dan’s career was dealing with the numerous medical procedures his daughter needed. This shifted his focus to wanting not just to make money but to contribute to making the care his daughter and others like her receive. Nell grew up observing her mother’s care of her brother who has an immune deficiency. Because of this she has been thinking about the problem of gathering data from patient experience for a long time. It intrigued Nell that medical decision making in her brother’s case was not really data-driven because of the paucity of usable data. Nell got advice that being a medical doctor was not the best way to pursue her interest. A project at MIT showed her the possibility of dealing with people’s health at the population level. This led her to transfer to Yale University. Dan speaks to the importance of working with people who are invested in the goal you are trying to achieve. Nells advice to founder in digital health: (1) avoid the temptation to be too conservative by recreating in digital form the processes as they exist in the non-digital world, and (2) avoid the opposite temptation of “swinging for the fences” in creating digital processes which are unmoored from the reality of the problems being addressed. Nell also spoke of “following the river” rather than trying to “climb the mountain”, ie follow the easiest path. Dan emphasized the importance of respecting patient ownership of data and also understanding the monetary value that it can have. The choice of Cystic Fibrosis as the first disease on which to focus was entirely serendipitous; it came from meeting a CF father at a Mass Challenge event. It has proven to be an excellent choice since the CF foundation is well organized and funded. Things moved so fast that they got a pilot started in three weeks, an unusually short time in the medical space. An example of following the river rather than trying to climb the mountain. Folia is now getting pulled in by foundations for other conditions. An important milestone for Folia: a patient recently brought in a full year of Folia-recorded data to her annual visit with her doctor. 

Invest Alongside Boston's Leading Angels: <a href="https://www.angelinvestboston.com/our-syndicates" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Learn More About Our Syndicates</a> Two young founders on a mission to get valuable data about complex illnesses which are not now easily captured. Nell Meosky Luo and Dan Toffling of Folia Health tell the story of how their startup came together and where it’s headed. Highlights include: <ul> <li>Nell Meosky Luo bio.</li> <li>Dan Toffling bio.</li> <li>What Folia Health does. Patients dealing with complex or chronic illnesses possess a wealth of data that is not now transmitted via the five to ten annual interactions a patient has with a physician.</li> <li>Both Nell and Dan have seen the problem in their immediate families.</li> <li>Built an online platform that patients can use to record important information.</li> <li>This information can be used to guide the patient’s clinical care and, in anonymized form, can be valuable research data.</li> <li>Sal notes that the user experience of their platform looks very accessible. Folia has spent a lot of time on getting the right interactions with patients.</li> <li>How Folia Health came about. Nell notice that researchers did not have access to this kind of data that her mom collected on her brother’s condition. This gave her the idea of finding a way to capture that type of data.</li> <li>Existing data on long-term impact of therapies is usually indirect such as insurance claims statistics.</li> <li>Nell worked on the idea for a year then advertised for a co-founder on <a href="http://BostonStartupsGuide.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">BostonStartupsGuide.com</a> and connected with Dan Toffling.</li> <li>Sal asks for you to leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.</li> <li>How Folia Health plans to go to market.</li> <li>Company is emerging from exclusive product focus to focusing on going to market as well. Referral by people in the disease communities is one channel, another is working with clinics. Folia is initially concentrating on Cystic Fibrosis which has highly motivated and organized patients and families.</li> <li>Dan uses Folia with his daughter who has Down’s Syndrome. Dan’s daughter is eager to cash in the certificates for Starbuck’s Cake Pops that Folia Health provides to users to increase engagement.</li> <li>As a user, Dan values the “appointment guides” the platform provides to summarize the information recorded and make it usable at a doctor visit.</li> <li>Makes patients the stewards of their own information and provides continuity when a patient changes doctor.</li> <li>Folia is very transparent about use of data collected and gives patients control over their data.</li> <li>Sal talks about startup Healthjump which works with Electronic Health Records. Link to interview of Healthjump founder, Martin Aboitiz: <a href="https://www.angelinvestboston.com/ep-24" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Interview with Healthjump Founder Martin Aboitiz</a></li> <li>Nell makes the point that EHRs are really about helping providers get paid by insurers and only tangentially about recording information that can be used to treat patients.</li> <li>Folia plans to make money by selling the anonymized data their system collects to stakeholders who need more data about how their products or services perform with patients. These include providers, pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies and academic researchers.</li> <li>Sal brings up his interview with Keith Elliston, founder of Axiomedix in which they discussed the startup combining patient records with their genomic data in an anonymized data base for research (<a href="https://www.angelinvestboston.com/ep-54" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Link to Keith Elliston Episode and Page</a>).</li> <li>Dan Toffling credits users for their help in making Folia Health’s platform user-friendly.</li> <li>Dan got into computer technology because his father was an engineer. He emphasizes the need to acquire technical expertise before trying to do things on your own.</li> <li>The example is given of Bill Gates dropping out of college to start Microsoft kind of obscures the fact that he had been coding since an early age at a time and was a highly-skilled software engineer when he dropped out of Harvard.</li> <li>Another turning point of Dan’s career was dealing with the numerous medical procedures his daughter needed. This shifted his focus to wanting not just to make money but to contribute to making the care his daughter and others like her receive.</li> <li>Nell grew up observing her mother’s care of her brother who has an immune deficiency. Because of this she has been thinking about the problem of gathering data from patient experience for a long time.</li> <li>It intrigued Nell that medical decision making in her brother’s case was not really data-driven because of the paucity of usable data.</li> <li>Nell got advice that being a medical doctor was not the best way to pursue her interest.</li> <li>A project at MIT showed her the possibility of dealing with people’s health at the population level. This led her to transfer to Yale University.</li> <li>Dan speaks to the importance of working with people who are invested in the goal you are trying to achieve.</li> <li>Nells advice to founder in digital health: (1) avoid the temptation to be too conservative by recreating in digital form the processes as they exist in the non-digital world, and (2) avoid the opposite temptation of “swinging for the fences” in creating digital processes which are unmoored from the reality of the problems being addressed. Nell also spoke of “following the river” rather than trying to “climb the mountain”, ie follow the easiest path.</li> <li>Dan emphasized the importance of respecting patient ownership of data and also understanding the monetary value that it can have.</li> <li>The choice of Cystic Fibrosis as the first disease on which to focus was entirely serendipitous; it came from meeting a CF father at a Mass Challenge event. It has proven to be an excellent choice since the CF foundation is well organized and funded. Things moved so fast that they got a pilot started in three weeks, an unusually short time in the medical space. An example of following the river rather than trying to climb the mountain.</li> <li>Folia is now getting pulled in by foundations for other conditions.</li> <li>An important milestone for Folia: a patient recently brought in a full year of Folia-recorded data to her annual visit with her doctor.</li> </ul>

Nell Meosky Luo & Dan Toffling - "Folia: Enabling Precision Care"

The Early Stage Podcast pushes forward with a women in digital health takeover! Nell Meosky Luo, Founder &amp; CEO of Folia Health, is today's guest, and my former colleague and MassChallenge HealthTech Director of Operations, Nina Kandilian, is my co-host.The oldest of seven children and older sister to a brother with Common Variable Immune Deficiency, Nell is no stranger to supporting another with their complex disease state.It took a block of ice literally falling on her head on a New York City sidewalk for her to realize she needed to follow her passion as opposed to dying a consultant.She thought back to her experience with her brother and how difficult it was to match specific treatments to specific patients for complex diseases like CVID or Cystic Fibrosis. After over a year of working on the project nights and weekends (it can be done, 9-to-5ers!), Nell launched Folia Health to monitor patient-reported outcomes in a structured way, elevating appointments with clinicians and leading to better health outcomes.Listen in to hear more about how she's making it happen.Folia Health Website - https://www.foliahealth.com/Early Stage Podcast Website - https://www.earlystagepodcast.com/

The Early Stage Podcast pushes forward with a women in digital health takeover! Nell Meosky Luo, Founder &amp; CEO of Folia Health, is today's guest, and my former colleague and MassChallenge HealthTech Director of Operations, Nina Kandilian, is my co-host. The oldest of seven children and older sister to a brother with Common Variable Immune Deficiency, Nell is no stranger to supporting another with their complex disease state. It took a block of ice literally falling on her head on a New York City sidewalk for her to realize she needed to follow her passion as opposed to dying a consultant. She thought back to her experience with her brother and how difficult it was to match specific treatments to specific patients for complex diseases like CVID or Cystic Fibrosis. After over a year of working on the project nights and weekends (it can be done, 9-to-5ers!), Nell launched Folia Health to monitor patient-reported outcomes in a structured way, elevating appointments with clinicians and leading to better health outcomes. Listen in to hear more about how she's making it happen. Folia Health Website - <a href="https://www.foliahealth.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.foliahealth.com/</a> Early Stage Podcast Website - <a href="https://www.earlystagepodcast.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.earlystagepodcast.com/</a>

Folia Health - Nell Meosky Luo, Founder & CEO