As a nurse practitioner, Lauren Wright knew she needed to help both health care professionals and mothers when the coronavirus pandemic raged throughout the U.S.
"I was just so frustrated when this first hit," Wright said. "I thought, 'What in the world can I do?' Because I have so many colleagues on the frontlines, I was hearing so many stories."
Wright is the founder of The Natural Nipple, a startup focused on creating baby bottles to mimic a woman's breast for better and safer feeding. While her company hit a snag in 2020 due to a pause in manufacturing in China, Wright pivoted to a field that's exploded during the pandemic: telehealth.
The company is preparing to give virtual visits for new mothers, as well as lactation consultations. Those visits also come with an at-home stool test kit, for a gut microbiome analysis that can lead to getting custom probiotics.
"I'm excited because these services are so helpful at this time," Wright said. "So many women are wanting confidence, asking 'Is this normal, what I'm experiencing?' While it's not medical care, it can help prevent complications and provides support and advocacy. So much of it is, you just want to hear you're doing the right thing and need a little evaluation."
But Wright wants to take it one step further and has launched the IFundWomen campaign, that, if fully funded at $250,000, would allow the company to provide telehealth services for free through the end of the year.
"That's bolstering our medical infrastructure if we can keep moms out of urgent care or the ER," Wright said. "If they have a question like, 'I don't know if I should come in,' that's the benefit of having primary care providers (available over telehealth). And remote access is crucial as we're trying to keep frontlines as strong as possible."
While many companies have pivoted in a new direction because of coronavirus, Wright said the telehealth services have always been part of the plan.
"I didn’t want to confuse our market too much, but it's always been the plan to have digital and probiotic components," Wright said. "We decided with the pandemic we wanted to bring those services to the forefront. What do we have to protect our community? And it just made sense; we don't need a bottle."
The bottle is currently unavailable as it needs to undergo a clinical trial which was put on hold after coronavirus-related manufacturing delays in China. The campaign, if fully funded, would help the clinical trial begin in August.
"It was a hard time," Wright said. "As soon as our manufacturer (in China) opened back up, then our entire economy is affected over here in the U.S. And it's a totally different market in raising (funding). That's where this crowdfunding will make such a difference for us. We can get the product for women but then we can also test with the engineers."
The slew of changes come from a previous series of successes for Wright. She won a grant from the National Science Foundation in 2018, was a finalist in Steve Case's Rise of the Rest Challenge and shortly after snagged a $50,000 deal with Johnson & Johnson in 2019.
