Diabetes health care startup Ryse Health has raised $3.4 million in seed funding, with plans to expand into at least two additional markets over the next two years.
The 11-person company opened its Baltimore location in March, its second after the opening of an Arlington, Virginia location last July. The main backer for Ryse Health was Pittsburgh-based W Health Ventures, which invested $2 million. The company was also accepted into the second cohort of the 1501 Health incubator this spring and has received funding from the incubator's founders, LifeBridge Health and CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield.
Co-founder and CEO Richard Gurley said the company plans to start a Series A funding round later this year. This is the first funding round for Ryse Health, which was started in 2020. The company plans to use the new funding to hire more employees and add at least two markets, though Gurley declined to reveal more details on the new locations.
Ryse Health uses technology to help provide Type 2 diabetes patients more frequent contact with health care professionals — including an endocrinologist, a diabetes educator, a health coach, a dietitian and a behavioral health specialist — in order to help improve their blood glucose management. Patients are set up with an app so they can contact the health team, log their dietand access diabetes education. The company also has its patients use a continuous glucose monitor, allowing for constant monitoring of blood sugar to help the team develop strategies to improve a patient's glucose levels without requiring a visit to the doctor's office.
"Patients find it really empowering to see how their body works and what impacts their blood sugar," Co-founder and Chief Medical Officer Erin Kane said.
Kane said many people with Type 2 diabetes typically only get treated by a primary care physician, who is often overworked and lacks the specific knowledge of an endocrinologist.
“Diabetes has grown to be this more complex problem that merits a specialist, but historically our system has thought of diabetes [as being] cared for by primary care physicians,” said Kane, a physician who previously worked for Johns Hopkins Medicine.
Unlike many other startups in the medical space, which focus entirely on the digital experience, Ryse Health places a strong importance on its physical clinics, Kane said. The clinics allow the company to help clients with their glucose monitor and other technologies, or have clients meet parts of their health care team in person to build trust.
“We believe that face-to-face interactions are really powerful,” Gurley said. “A lot of technology to treat diabetes in this world is complicated and we want to help our patients figure out how to use it in person. A lot of our patients are dealing with really challenging emotional and psychological issues, and the deep relationships they build with our care team help them power through those."
The company is networked with a variety of health insurance plans, including Medicare. Ryse Health reports that patients have seen stark improvements in glucose levels, with patients seeing a 36% decrease in elevated blood sugars after the first 60 days of the program. The company has served 220 patients so far.
Ryse Health's patient-centered approach partially comes from Kane drawing on her own experience with diabetes, giving her an understanding of the condition from the patient and clinical perspective. People with chronic illness benefit from frequent contact with health experts, where they get small-scale pointers, something Ryse Health can provide, instead of going to a doctor once every few months and receiving a long list of lifestyle changes, Kane said.
“It was really an opportunity to just take a blank piece of paper and say, what do patients with diabetes need to be healthy,” she said.
An earlier version of this article said Ryse Health would expand to two additional markets. The company has updated its remarks to say it will expand to at least two additional markets.
