Welcome to the latest edition of Re-Humanizing HealthTech, where we amplify and connect voices and people bringing humans back into healthcare.

I’m releasing this issue following a magnificent ice-pink sunrise reflecting off the winter waters in Nelson, New Zealand, where I’m visiting family. We can never have enough reminders to pause and appreciate the space that holds us.

I’ve spent an unfortunate amount of time in hospitals this week visiting a family member after surgery. It went well, and the many care providers involved were warm, attentive, thorough, and professional.

Yet, the maddening sameness of hospitals is skin-curdling. The alarms. The strange smells and Kafka-esque extending hallways. It’s almost a parallel to the uncanny valley, where everything looks fine on the surface, but something out of view threatens to morph the scene into a horror movie at any moment.

We talk about “hospital-grade” as a mark of quality and rigor. It’s used to advertise household cleaners, assuring us that we’re maintaining bacteria-free environments in our homes. But is that really the aspiration for hospitals? That we aim no higher than not getting more sick?

Hospital-grade should mean something better, especially when it’s indelibly linked with our society’s view of healthcare. It should stand for the highest ideals of healthcare and help people to holistically move forward with compassion, community, dignity, and independence. It should imply that people will be better off.

Post-op recovery is a journey, and it’s only the very beginning stages when the patient leaves the hospital or surgical facility. Occupational therapists and caregivers know this, but they’re hamstrung on many fronts and they’re not with their patients 24/7.

Our featured founder has lived these challenges, and is rising up to change the nature of recovery. Read more below.

In optimism,

Katie

Meet Cherizza. She’s building Kneed Health to transform surgery recovery from a lonely struggle to an empowering comeback. 

Why did you choose this path?

I was 12 when I had my first surgery. I would go on to have 7 more by the time I turned 33. That's 20 years, filled with the highs and lows of recovery. During the pandemic, I started sharing my recovery journey online and to my surprise, other surgery patients found me and started asking for advice and following my journey. I realized I got tremendous joy from being able to help them navigate their own recovery. That personal fulfillment made me start thinking bigger.

I took a broader view and saw alarming trends: surgeries are increasing annually, physical therapy compliance is low, and isolation, in general, has become epidemic. It suddenly felt urgent to build a solution to support all these people in their recovery. Given my firsthand experience, I figured why not me? In November, I finally took the leap, and I honestly can't imagine doing anything else. I'm energized by the opportunity to transform recovery for the millions of people who have surgery each year, turning what was once my greatest challenge into my greatest purpose.

What are the missing pieces for you right now?

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Executives to Founders. Meeting other individuals who have made the decision to leave the big job to bet on themselves. The sense checks are really important!

🩺 Health Tech Experts. My network spikes in FAANG and consumer tech. Connecting with the experts in a “new to me” industry to understand all the players is a top priority.

📊 Deep Market Research. Post surgery is vast. I need to find the underlying data to quantify the total economic impact of poor recovery outcomes.

🎯 Prioritization. As a solo founder, I’m wearing all the hats and everything feels urgent. I’m working on finding a manageable way to pick the right priorities that move the business forward.

🤖 AI Adoption. I'm using AI but know I'm only scratching the surface. I'm particularly interested in how other founders leverage AI for market research, customer discovery, and early product development.

🏆 Confidence in Sales. It’s all about selling! I’m open to tactics that can help me build confidence in selling myself, the vision and into B2B.

What gives you hope?

Seeing dreamers, builders and doers around me every single day. It’s the person down the street who opened their first restaurant, the artist who’s having their first gallery showing and it’s the busy mom who starts a side hustle - all of it gives me hope. I draw a massive amount of optimism from seeing other people achieve their goals; it lets me know that I can do it too.

What should post-op recovery look like and what are we even aiming for? A definition here references wholeness, control, independence, and well-being. Here’s a lighter look, with Amy Schumer normalizing recovery by shining a light on the awkward and dependent nature of the process.

Revisiting the Gates Foundation’s $2.5 billion women’s health investment. Here’s an argument for collaboration and commercialization (think being the application layer as Gates Foundation creates the infrastructure layer), and the original announcement here.

The narrow-minded system that is VC, and the ongoing search for alternative financing mechanisms. Check out the still-relevant framing of Permissionless Entrepreneurship and the recent launch of Catherine Bracy’s book World Eaters.

I’m pondering what excellent looks like in healthcare in 2030 here. We have to envision it to be able to make it happen.

I’m supporting Women’s Health Advocates at their Reception & Fundraiser on September 7th in San Francisco. Read more and join me here.

I help Seed & Series A healthtech startups design and build investor-grade revenue engines.