(from left) Kevin Dedner founded Hurdle, a mental health startup that pairs patients with therapists. Ashlee Wisdom’s company, Health in Her Hue, connects women of color with culturally sensitive medical providers. Nathan Pelzer’s Clinify Health analyzes data to help doctors identify at-risk patients in underserved areas. Erica Plybeah’s firm, MedHaul, arranges transport to medical appointments.
Kevin Dedner; Kolin Mendez Photography; Aaron Gang Photography; Starboard & Port Creative
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Kevin Dedner; Kolin Mendez Photography; Aaron Gang Photography; Starboard & Port Creative
(from left) Kevin Dedner founded Hurdle, a mental health startup that pairs patients with therapists. Ashlee Wisdom’s company, Health in Her Hue, connects women of color with culturally sensitive medical providers. Nathan Pelzer’s Clinify Health analyzes data to help doctors identify at-risk patients in underserved areas. Erica Plybeah’s firm, MedHaul, arranges transport to medical appointments.
Kevin Dedner; Kolin Mendez Photography; Aaron Gang Photography; Starboard & Port Creative
When Ashlee Wisdom launched an early version of her health and wellness website, more than 34,000 users — most of them Black — visited the platform in the first two weeks.
“It wasn’t the most fully functioning platform,” recalls Wisdom, 31. “It was not sexy.”
But the launch was successful. Now, more than a year later, Wisdom’s company, Health in Her Hue, connects Black women and other women of color to culturally sensitive doctors, doulas, nurses and therapists nationally.
As more patients seek culturally competent care — the acknowledgment of a patient’s heritage, beliefs and values during treatment — a new wave of Black tech founders like Wisdom want to help. In the same way Uber Eats and Grubhub revolutionized food delivery, Black tech health startups across the United States want to change how people exercise, how they eat and also how they communicate with doctors.
Inspired by their own experiences, plus those of their parents and grandparents, Black entrepreneurs are launching startups that aim to close the cultural gap in health care with technology — and create profitable businesses at the same time.
Seeing problems and solutions others miss
“One of the most exciting growth opportunities across health innovation is to back underrepresented founders building health companies focusing on underserved markets,” says Unity Stoakes, president and co-founder of StartUp Health, a company headquartered in San Francisco that has invested in a number of health companies led by people of color. He says those leaders have “an essential