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Bonnie’s Story –
“When my second son in law was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease (Crohn’s) I realized that my grand kids would have a double dose of these genes.”
I live with a decades-long, medically unexplained inflammatory MSK condition. I became CEO of my own health to coordinate digital, functional and conventional care. When a son-in-law was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, I realized my grandkids had a double dose of high-risk genes. This after a 30-year professional career as dentist, stock analyst and business development professional. Since I’d been working since 2010 in digital health for chronic disease management, it seemed obvious to apply big data and digital tools to the unmet needs of autoimmune patients. But my ah-ha! moment hit a wall.
Patient Journey –
The Winding Struggles of Autoimmune Disease
I found autoimmune disease is under-recognized, underfunded, and under-researched, because 100+ individual diseases compete for share of mind and funding. Contrast cancer, where 100+ diseases in a single category attract united attention, funding and R&D. Yet the prevalence of chronic immuno-inflammatory disorders (CIIDs), including autoimmune, autoinflammatory, uncategorized, uncharacterized and medically unexplained diseases (like mine!) is at least as big and costly as cancer.
“Autoimmune disease is underfunded, under-recognized and under-researched because each of the 100 individual diseases competes for funding and share of mind.”
Now fired to someday prevent autoimmune and other CIIDs in our children and grandchildren, I became a patient advocate, too, raising awareness through speaking, surveys, workshops, at Stanford Medicine X, SXSW, TEDx and more. I founded Autoimmune Connect to provide actionable information for patients and caretakers.
As digital health and virtual-first care innovations finally got traction under COVID-19, my company continues to provide consulting services to businesses that share our mission to bring the best of digital, functional and conventional medicine to CIID patients. We help companies tackle the unmet needs of this invisible epidemic with the tools of digital health, virtual care, and integrative medicine. I bring domain knowledge in exciting fields such as oral and gut microbiome, symptom tracking, digital behavior change platforms, and lifestyle self-hacking.