Ep. 81: Healthcare Innovation, Data Access & the Blockchain —with Kat Kuzmeskas of SimplyVital

Building a blockchain startup is hard enough. How do you educate the market around the technology itself? How do you communicate the business case for your product? But if you’re really looking for a challenge, build a company with a focus on innovation in the healthcare space—an industry notoriously slow to adopt advanced technology!
Katherine Kuzmeskas is the founder and CEO of SimplyVital Health, a startup building the blockchain infrastructure for healthcare. By way of open source and proprietary software, SimplyVital leverages the blockchain as a tool to increase data access and decrease the cost of healthcare, globally. Before becoming an entrepreneur, Kat cut her teeth in hospital administration, serving as Program Manager and Strategic Planner for the Yale New Haven Health system.
Today, Kat joins us to discuss the challenges of innovating in the healthcare space, describing the market’s slow adoption of advanced technology and the reteaching necessary around the role of the blockchain. She shares her interest in healthcare administration and explains how a year with Teach for America led to her idea for SimplyVital Health. Listen in for Kat’s insight on leading a global company and learn how persistence, organization and the will to win lend to her success as a startup founder.

Topics Covered

The function of SimplyVital
Blockchain infrastructure for healthcare
Proprietary and open-source software
Data access to decrease costs globally

Kat’s insight on leadership
Solo musician/athlete vs. band/team
Compare to CEO of global company

The challenges of innovating in healthcare
Slow to adopt advanced technology
Must understand business perspective

Kat’s advice for startups in the healthcare space
Identify customers, run product by them first
Remember that healthcare is business (ROI)

Kat’s path to founding SimplyVital Health
Clinical rotations in Ecuador
Interest in operations, administration
Teach for America student dashboard
Apply data-driven decision-making to healthcare

Kat’s strengths as a startup founder
Persistence (outwork others)
Extremely organized
Competitive, curious

How Kat educates the healthcare market on blockchain
Recognize long sales cycle
Reteach as necessary
Consulting arm, course on Udemy

How Kat financed SimplyVital
Self-funded first year
Equity round with venture investors
Revenue from purchase of tokens

Kat’s definition of success
Personal fulfillment
Doing good in world

Connect with Kat

SimplyVital Health https://www.simplyvitalhealth.com/
SimplyVital on Twitter https://twitter.com/SimplyVitalHQ
SimplyVital on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/SimplyVitalHealth/
SimplyVital on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/simplyvital-health/
Kat on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/katherinekuzmeskas/
Kat on Twitter https://twitter.com/kkuzmesk?lang=en

Resources

Blockchain and Healthcare on Udemy https://www.udemy.com/blockchain-and-healthcare/
Chuck Klosterman X: A Highly Specific, Defiantly Incomplete History of the Early 21st Century by Chuck Klosterman
http://chuckklostermanauthor.com/books/chuck-klosterman-x-tr/chuck-klosterman-x-hc

Connect with Boost VC

Boost VC Website https://www.boost.vc/
Boost VC on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/boostvc/
Boost VC on Twitter https://twitter.com/BoostVC