SJF Leads Series A Financing for Fit4D
NEW YORK – August 19, 2015 – Fit4D (http://www.fit4d.com), a digital health company that is improving the health of people with diabetes, announced today that it has secured Series A funding from SJF Ventures, Sovereign Health System and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska. The funding will enable the company to expand distribution of its innovative diabetes platform across new customer channels and to leverage the platform to improve health outcomes for other chronic diseases.
For pharmaceutical companies with a branded diabetes drug or device, Fit4D optimizes the mix between technology and diabetes-expert clinicians, also known as Certified Diabetes Educators (CDEs), to improve adherence to the drug or device in an affordable manner. The platform works with intelligent-scripting algorithms that enable diabetes expert clinicians to more than triple their capacity to deliver personalized care. Unlike apps or call centers, Fit4D offers a high-touch, personalized experience for patient populations that leverages proprietary technology and methodologies to demonstrably improve adherence in manner that provides over a 3x payback for customers.
For Payers seeking to improve quality measures, Fit4D utilizes the diabetes platform to reduce the HbA1c values of members at highest risk while increasing member engagement with their personal CDE.
Managing diabetes is complicated. Effective diabetes management involves motivating patients to take their prescribed medications, integrating healthy lifestyle (nutrition, exercise, weight management etc.), coping with the ongoing emotional stresses of the disease, and using measurement tools such as blood glucose meters and lab tests. Achieving positive health outcomes is made more challenging as every patient starts in a different place, continues on their own unique journey, responds differently to messaging and has distinct and varied hurdles. The challenge of providing effective and on-going support is compounded for most healthcare professionals who have limited time during appointments.
Fit4D uses multi-channel communication technology and intelligent scripting algorithms to segment patient populations enabling Certified Diabetes Educators (CDEs) to deliver personalized care with increased member volumes. By empowering every CDE with a data-driven approach to improve health measures, Fit4D increases each CDE’s patient capacity by over 3x from 120 to 400.
The Fit4D platform provides electronic interactions in patient-preferred modalities (e.g. phone, email, text, web, video, etc.) that address patient-specific issues (e.g. overwhelmed, fear of needles, language barriers, etc.), in the patient’s preferred format (e.g. articles, videos, webinars, etc.) and at the patient’s preferred time of day (after putting children to bed, before work in the morning, etc.)
“Fit4D has the opportunity to transform the way our health system treats real people suffering from diabetes and other chronic diseases,” said Cody Nystrom, Managing Director at SJF Ventures. “Fit4D’s history in diabetes education provided the necessary experience and domain expertise to create a proprietary medical adherence solution built, tested and proven to work for real patients engaged through pharmaceutical and payer clients. Fit4D has the potential to impact millions of people with diabetes and other chronic diseases by providing personalized clinical support made scalable through the use of technology.”
“Providers are always seeking innovative solutions to improve medication adherence and health outcomes,” said Dr. Joann Schaefer, Chief Medical Officer and senior vice president for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska. “Fit4D brings a personalized experience to members while providing value-based services to providers.”
“Sovereign Health System enhances patient health by delivering evidence-based, cost-efficient care that utilizes clinical data to individualize treatment to optimal effect. Given Fit4D’s data-driven approach to improving the health of people with diabetes, this is a very natural and strategic investment for our organization,” said John Hajjar, MD, FACS, MBA, founder, chairman and CEO of Sovereign Health System.
“Fit4D’s mission is to improve the health of people with diabetes everywhere in the world,” said David Weingard, Fit4D Chief Executive Officer. “We are excited to partner with our investors to achieve this mission and will continue to leverage technology to scale the reach of our diabetes-expert clinicians. We will also customize the Fit4D platform to improve medication adherence and health outcomes for patients with other chronic diseases. Everyone on the Fit4D team is passionate about helping patients and positively impacting the healthcare landscape.”
About Fit4D
Fit4D’s mission is to improve the lives of people living with diabetes worldwide. Fit4D delivers scalable and effective patient programs through an optimized mix of its technology platform and human-based touch points. The Fit4D clinical team, comprised of dietitians, exercise physiologists, nurses, and social workers, many of whom are also certified diabetes educators (CDEs), focuses on empowering people with diabetes to live rich, healthy and fulfilling lives. Fit4D’s Fortune 500 clients include pharmaceutical, payer, provider and wellness companies. Fit4D has also engaged in numerous joint initiatives with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, American Diabetes Association, and Diabetes Research Institute.
Fit4D is also a member of the StartUp Health Academy, a network of digital health companies dedicated to innovation across the globe.
About SJF Ventures
SJF Ventures is a venture capital fund with offices in Durham, NC, New York and San Francisco. SJF has a 16-year successful record of assisting visionary and talented management teams in building industry-leading firms providing meaningful societal impact. SJF provides strong expertise and networks in the technology-enhanced services sectors of energy, infrastructure, health and education. For more information visit www.sjfventures.com.
About Sovereign Health System
Sovereign Health System (www.sovereignhealthsystem.com) is a fully integrated multi-specialty community healthcare system serving the people of the New York City metropolitan area through its network of primary care and specialty physicians, laboratory facilities, urgent care clinics, outpatient surgery centers, and outpatient cancer-treatment centers.
About Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska is a community-based, member-owned health insurance company serving approximately 700,000 people. For more than 75 years, BCBSNE has been committed to protecting Nebraska families and delivering the health and wellness solutions Nebraskans value most. Recent honors include the Platinum Well Workplace Award from the Wellness Councils of America and the Better Business Bureau’s Integrity Award. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska is an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association.
